1906

MARK TWAIN'S SPEECHES

by Mark Twain

PREFACE

PREFACE.

FROM THE PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITION OF

"MARK TWAIN'S SKETCHES."

If I were to sell the reader a barrel of molasses, and he, instead

of sweetening his substantial dinner with the same at judicious

intervals, should eat the entire barrel at one sitting, and then abuse

me for making him sick, I would say that he deserved to be made sick

for not knowing any better how to utilize the blessings this world

affords. And if I sell to the reader this volume of nonsense, and

he, instead of seasoning his graver reading with a chapter of it now

and then, when his mind demands such relaxation, unwisely overdoses

himself with several chapters of it at a single sitting, he will

deserve to be nauseated, and he will have nobody to blame but

himself if he is. There is no more sin in publishing an entire

volume of nonsense than there is in keeping a candy-store with no

hardware in it. It lies wholly with the customer whether he will

injure himself by means of either, or will derive from them the

benefits which they will afford him if he uses their possibilities

judiciously.

Respectfully submitted,

THE AUTHOR.

THE STORY OF A SPEECH.

An address delivered in 1877, and a review of it twenty-nine years

later. The original speech was delivered at a dinner given by the

publishers of The Atlantic Monthly in honor of the seventieth

anniversary of the birth of John Greenleaf Whittier, at the Hotel

Brunswick, Boston, December 17, 1877.

THIS is an occasion peculiarly meet for the digging up of pleasant

reminiscences concerning literary folk; therefore I will drop

lightly into history myself. Standing here on the shore of the

Atlantic and contemplating certain of its largest literary billows,

I am reminded of a thing which happened to me thirteen years ago, when

I had just succeeded in stirring up a little Nevadian literary

puddle myself, whose spume-flakes were beginning to blow thinly

Californiaward. I started an inspection tramp through the southern

mines of California. I was callow and conceited, and I resolved to try

the virtue of my nom de guerre.

I very soon had an opportunity. I knocked at a miner's lonely log

cabin in the foot-hills of the Sierras just at nightfall. It was

snowing at the time. A jaded, melancholy man of fifty, barefooted,

opened the door to me. When he heard my nom de guerre he looked more

dejected than before. He let me in- pretty reluctantly, I thought- and

after the customary bacon and beans, black coffee and hot whiskey, I

took a pipe. This sorrowful man had not said three words up to this

time. Now he spoke up and said, in the voice of one who is secretly

suffering, "You're the fourth- I'm going to move." "The fourth

what?" said I. "The fourth littery man that has been here in

twenty-four hours- I'm going to move." "You don't tell me!" said I;

"who were the others?" "Mr. Longfellow, Mr. Emerson, and Mr. Oliver

Wendell Holmes- consound the lot!"

You can easily believe I was interested. I supplicated- three hot

whiskeys did the rest- and finally the melancholy miner began. Said

he:

"They came here just at dark yesterday evening, and I let them in of

course. Said they were going to the Yosemite. They were a rough lot,

but that's nothing; everybody looks rough that travels afoot. Mr.

Emerson was a seedy little bit of a chap, red-headed. Mr. Holmes was

as fat as a balloon; he weighed as much as three hundred, and had

double chins all the way down to his stomach. Mr. Longfellow was built

like a prize-fighter. His head was cropped and bristly, like as if

he had a wig made of hair-brushes. His nose lay straight down his

face, like a finger with the end joint tilted up. They had been

drinking, I could see that. And what queer talk they used! Mr.

Holmes inspected this cabin, then he took me by the buttonhole, and

says he:

"'Through the deep caves of thought

I hear a voice that sings,

Build thee more stately mansions,

O my soul!'

"Says I, 'I can't afford it, Mr. Holmes, and moreover I don't want

to.' Blamed if I liked it pretty well, either, coming from a stranger,

that way. However, I started to get out my bacon and beans, when Mr.

Emerson came and looked on awhile, and then he takes me aside by the

buttonhole and says:

"'Give me agates for my meat;

Give me cantharids to eat;

From air and ocean bring me foods,

From all zones and altitudes.'

"Says I, 'Mr. Emerson, if you'll excuse me, this ain't no hotel.'

You see it sort of riled me- I warn't used to the ways of littery

swells. But I went on a-sweating over my work, and next comes Mr.

Longfellow and buttonholes me, and interrupts me. Says he:

"'Honor be to Mudjekeewis!

You shall hear how Pau-Puk-Keewis-'

"But I broke in, and says I, 'Beg your pardon, Mr. Longfellow, if

you'll be so kind as to hold your yawp for about five minutes and

let me get this grub ready, you'll do me proud.' Well, sir, after

they'd filled up I set out the jug. Mr. Holmes looks at it, and then

he fires up all of a sudden and yells:

"'Flash out a stream of blood-red wine!

For I would drink to other days.'

"By George, I was getting kind of worked up. I don't deny it, I

was getting kind of worked up. I turns to Mr. Holmes, and says I,

'Looky here, my fat friend, I'm a-running this shanty, and if the

court knows herself, you'll take whiskey straight or you'll go dry.'

Them's the very words I said to him. Now I don't want to sass such

famous littery people, but you see they kind of forced me. There ain't

nothing unreasonable 'bout me; I don't mind a passel of guests

a-treadin' on my tail three or four times, but when it comes to

standing on it it's different, 'and if the court knows herself,' I

says, 'you'll take whiskey straight or you'll go dry.' Well, between

drinks they'd swell around the cabin and strike attitudes and spout;

and pretty soon they got out a greasy old deck and went to playing

euchre at ten cents a corner- on trust. I began to notice some

pretty suspicious things. Mr. Emerson dealt, looked at his hand, shook

his head, says:

"'I am the doubter and the doubt-'

and ca'mly bunched the hands and went to shuffling for a new layout.

Says he:

"'They reckon ill who leave me out;

They know not well the subtle ways I keep.

I pass and deal again!'

"Hang'd if he didn't go ahead and do it, too! Oh, he was a cool one!

Well, in about a minute things were running pretty tight, but all of a

sudden I see by Mr. Emerson's eye he judged he had 'em. He had already

corralled two tricks, and each of the others one. So now he kind of

lifts a little in his chair and says:

"'I tire of globes and aces!-

Too long the game is played!'

- and down he fetched a right bower. Mr. Longfellow smiles as sweet as

pie and says:

"'Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend,

For the lesson thou hast taught,'

- and blamed if he didn't down with another right bower! Emerson

claps his hand on his bowie, Longfellow claps his on his revolver, and

I went under a bunk. There was going to be trouble; but that monstrous

Holmes rose up, wobbling his double chins, and says he, 'Order,

gentlemen; the first man that draws, I'll lay down on him and

smother him!' All quiet on the Potomac, you bet!

"They were pretty how-come-you-so by now, and they begun to blow.

Emerson says, 'The nobbiest thing I ever wrote was "Barbara

Frietchie."' Says Longfellow, 'It don't begin with my "Biglow

Papers."' Says Holmes, 'My "Thanatopis" lays over 'em both.' They

mighty near ended in a fight. Then they wished they had some more

company- and Mr. Emerson pointed to me and says:

"'Is yonder squalid peasant all

That this proud nursery could breed?'

"He was a-whetting his bowie on his boot- so I let it pass. Well,

sir, next they took it into their heads that they would like some

music; so they made me stand up and sing "When Johnny Comes Marching

Home" till I dropped- at thirteen minutes past four this morning.

That's what I've been through, my friend. When I woke at seven, they

were leaving, thank goodness, and Mr. Longfellow had my only boots on,

and his'n under his arm. Says I, 'Hold on, there, Evangeline, what are

you going to do with them?' He says, 'Going to make tracks with 'em;

because:

"'Lives of great men all remind us

We can make our lives sublime;

And, departing, leave behind us

Footprints on the sands of time.'

As I said, Mr. Twain, you are the fourth in twenty-four hours- and I'm

going to move; I ain't suited to a littery atmosphere."

I said to the miner, "Why, my dear sir, these were not the

gracious singers to whom we and the world pay loving reverence and

homage; these were impostors."

The miner investigated me with a calm eye for a while; then said he,

"Ah! impostors, were they? Are you?"

I did not pursue the subject, and since then I have not travelled on

my nom de guerre enough to hurt. Such was the reminiscence I was moved

to contribute, Mr. Chairman. In my enthusiasm I may have exaggerated

the details a little, but you will easily forgive me that fault, since

I believe it is the first time I have ever deflected from

perpendicular fact on an occasion like this.

From Mark Twain's Autobiography.

January 11, 1906.

Answer to a letter received this morning:

DEAR MRS. H.,- I am forever your debtor for reminding me of that

curious passage in my life. During the first year or two after it

happened, I could not bear to think of it. My pain and shame were so

intense, and my sense of having been an imbecile so settled,

established and confirmed, that I drove the episode entirely from my

mind- and so all these twenty-eight or twenty-nine years I have

lived in the conviction that my performance of that time was coarse,

vulgar, and destitute of humor. But your suggestion that you and

your family found humor in it twenty-eight years ago moved me to

look into the matter. So I commissioned a Boston typewriter to delve

among the Boston papers of that bygone time and send me a copy of it.

It came this morning, and if there is any vulgarity about it I am

not able to discover it. If it isn't innocently and ridiculously

funny, I am no judge. I will see to it that you get a copy.

What I have said to Mrs. H. is true. I did suffer during a year or

two from the deep humiliations of that episode. But at last, in

1888, in Venice, my wife and I came across Mr. and Mrs. A. P. C., of

Concord, Massachusetts, and a friendship began then of the sort

which nothing but death terminates. The C.'s were very bright people

and in every way charming and companionable. We were together a

month or two in Venice and several months in Rome, afterward, and

one day that lamented break of mine was mentioned. And when I was on

the point of lathering those people for bringing it to my mind when

I had gotten the memory of it almost squelched, I perceived with joy

that the C.'s were indignant about the way that my performance had

been received in Boston. They poured out their opinions most freely

and frankly about the frosty attitude of the people who were present

at that performance, and about the Boston newspapers for the

position they had taken in regard to the matter. That position was

that I had been irreverent beyond belief, beyond imagination. Very

well; I had accepted that as a fact for a year or two, and had been

thoroughly miserable about it whenever I thought of it- which was

not frequently, if I could help it. Whenever I thought of it I

wondered how I ever could have been inspired to do so unholy a

thing. Well, the C.'s comforted me, but they did not persuade me to

continue to think about the unhappy episode. I resisted that. I

tried to get it out of my mind, and let it die, and I succeeded. Until

Mrs. H.'s letter came, it had been a good twenty-five years since I

had thought of that matter; and when she said that the thing was funny

I wondered if possibly she might be right. At any rate, my curiosity

was aroused, and I wrote to Boston and got the whole thing copied,

as above set forth.

I vaguely remember some of the details of that gathering- dimly I

can see a hundred people no, perhaps fifty- shadowy figures sitting at

tables feeding, ghosts now to me, and nameless forevermore. I don't

know who they were, but I can very distinctly see, seated at the grand

table and facing the rest of us, Mr. Emerson, supernaturally grave,

unsmiling? Mr. Whittier, grave, lovely, his beautiful spirit shining

out of his face; Mr. Longfellow, with his silken white hair and his

benignant face; Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, flashing smiles and

affection and all good-fellowship everywhere like a rose-diamond whose

facets are being turned toward the light first one way and then

another- a charming man, and always fascinating, whether he was

talking or whether he was sitting still (what he would call still, but

what would be more or less motion to other people). I can see those

figures with entire distinctness across this abyss of time.

One other feature is clear- Willie Winter (for these past thousand

years dramatic editor of the New York Tribune, and still occupying

that high post in his old age) was there. He was much younger then

than he is now, and he showed it. It was always a pleasure to me to

see Willie Winter at a banquet. During a matter of twenty years I

was seldom at a banquet where Willie Winter was not also present,

and where he did not read a charming poem written for the occasion. He

did it this time, and it was up to standard: dainty, happy, choicely

phrased, and as good to listen to as music, and sounding exactly as if

it was pouring unprepared out of heart and brain.

Now at that point ends all that was pleasurable about that notable

celebration of Mr. Whittier's seventieth birthday- because I got up at

that point and followed Winter, with what I have no doubt I supposed

would be the gem of the evening- the gay oration above quoted from the

Boston paper. I had written it all out the day before and had

perfectly memorized it, and I stood up there at my genial and happy

and self-satisfied ease, and begin to deliver it. Those majestic

guests, that row of venerable and still active volcanoes, listened, as

did everybody else in the house, with attentive interest. Well, I

delivered myself of- we'll say the first two hundred words of my

speech. I was expecting no returns from that part of the speech, but

this was not the case as regarded the rest of it. I arrived now at the

dialogue: "The old miner said, 'You are the fourth, I'm going to

move.' 'The fourth what?' said I. He answered, 'The fourth littery man

that has been here in twenty-four hours. I am going to move.' 'Why,

you don't tell me,' said I. 'Who were the others?' 'Mr. Longfellow,

Mr. Emerson, Mr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, consound the lot-'"

Now, then, the house's attention continued, but the expression of

interest in the faces turned to a sort of black frost. I wondered what

the trouble was. I didn't know. I went on, but with difficulty- I

struggled along, and entered upon that miner's fearful description

of the bogus Emerson, the bogus Holmes, the bogus Longfellow, always

hoping- but with a gradually perishing hope- that somebody would

laugh, or that somebody would at least smile, but nobody did. I didn't

know enough to give it up and sit down, I was too new to public

speaking, and so I went on with this awful performance, and carried it

clear through to the end, in front of a body of people who seemed

turned to stone with horror. It was the sort of expression their faces

would have worn if I had been making these remarks about the Deity and

the rest of the Trinity; there is no milder way in which to describe

the petrified condition and the ghastly expression of those people.

When I sat down it was with a heart which had long ceased to beat. I

shall never be as dead again as I was then. I shall never be as

miserable again as I was then. I speak now as one who doesn't know

what the condition of things may be in the next world, but in this one

I shall never be as wretched again as I was then. Howells, who was

near me, tried to say a comforting word, but couldn't get beyond a

gasp. There was no use- he understood the whole size of the

disaster. He had good intentions, but the words froze before they

could get out. It was an atmosphere that would freeze anything. If

Benvenuto Cellini's salamander had been in that place he would not

have survived to be put into Cellini's autobiography. There was a

frightful pause. There was an awful silence, a desolating silence.

Then the next man on the list had to get up- there was no help for it.

That was Bishop- Bishop had just burst handsomely upon the world

with a most acceptable novel, which had appeared in The Atlantic

Monthly, a place which would make any novel respectable and any author

noteworthy. In this case the novel itself was recognized as being,

without extraneous help, respectable. Bishop was away up in the public

favor, and he was an object of high interest, consequently there was a

sort of national expectancy in the air; we may say our American

millions were standing, from Maine to Texas and from Alaska to

Florida, holding their breath, their lips parted, their hands ready to

applaud, when Bishop should get up on that occasion, and for the first

time in his life speak in public. It was under these damaging

conditions that he got up to "make good," as the vulgar say. I had

spoken several times before, and that is the reason why I was able

to go on without dying in my tracks, as I ought to have done- but

Bishop had had no experience. He was up facing those awful deities-

facing those other people, those strangers- facing human beings for

the first time in his life, with a speech to utter. No doubt it was

well packed away in his memory, no doubt it was fresh and usable,

until I had been heard from. I suppose that after that, and under

the smothering pall of that dreary silence, it began to waste away and

disappear out of his head like the rags breaking from the edge of a

fog, and presently there wasn't any fog left. He didn't go on- he

didn't last long. It was not many sentences after his first before

he began to hesitate, and break, and lose his grip, and totter, and

wobble, and at last he slumped down in a limp and mushy pile.

Well, the programme for the occasion was probably not more than

one-third finished, but it ended there. Nobody rose. The next man

hadn't strength enough to get up, and everybody looked so dazed, so

stupefied, paralyzed, it was impossible for anybody to do anything, or

even try. Nothing could go on in that strange atmosphere. Howells

mournfully, and without words, hitched himself to Bishop and me and

supported us out of the room. It was very kind- he was most

generous. He towed us tottering away into some room in that

building, and we sat down there. I don't know what my remark was

now, but I know the nature of it. It was the kind of remark you make

when you know that nothing in the world can help your case. But

Howells was honest- he had to say the heart-breaking things he did

say: that there was no help for this calamity, this shipwreck, this

cataclysm; that this was the most disastrous thing that had ever

happened in anybody's history- and then he added, "That is, for you-

and consider what you have done for Bishop. It is bad enough in your

case, you deserve to suffer. You have committed this crime, and you

deserve to have all you are going to get. But here is an innocent man.

Bishop had never done you any harm, and see what you have done to him.

He can never hold his head up again. The world can never look upon

Bishop as being a live person. He is a corpse."

That is the history of that episode of twenty-eight years ago, which

pretty nearly killed me with shame during that first year or two

whenever it forced its way into my mind.

Now then, I take that speech up and examine it. As I said, it

arrived this morning, from Boston. I have read it twice, and unless

I am an idiot, it hasn't a single defect in it from the first word

to the last. It is just as good as good can be. It is smart; it is

saturated with humor. There isn't a suggestion of coarseness or

vulgarity in it anywhere. What could have been the matter with that

house? It is amazing, it is incredible, that they didn't shout with

laughter, and those deities the loudest of them all. Could the fault

have been with me? Did I lose courage when I saw those great men up

there whom I was going to describe in such a strange fashion? If

that happened, if I showed doubt, that can account for it, for you

can't be successfully funny if you show that you are afraid of it.

Well, I can't account for it, but if I had those beloved and revered

old literary immortals back here now on the platform at Carnegie

Hall I would take that same old speech, deliver it, word for word, and

melt them till they'd run all over that stage. Oh, the fault must have

been with me, it is not in the speech at all.

PLYMOUTH ROCK AND THE PILGRIMS.

ADDRESS AT THE FIRST ANNUAL DINNER, N. E. SOCIETY,

PHILADELPHIA, DECEMBER 22, 1881.

On calling upon Mr. Clemens to make response, President Rollins

said:

"This sentiment has been assigned to one who was never exactly

born in New England, nor, perhaps, were any of his ancestors. He is

not technically, therefore, of New England descent. Under the

painful circumstances in which he has found himself, however, he has

done the best he could- he has had all his children born there, and

has made of himself a New England ancestor. He is a self-made man.

More than this, and better even, in cheerful, hopeful, helpful

literature he is of New England ascent. To ascend there in anything

that's reasonable is difficult, for- confidentially, with the door

shut- we all know that they are the brightest, ablest sons of that

goodly land who never leave it, and it is among and above them that

Mr. Twain has made his brilliant and permanent ascent- become a man of

mark."

I RISE to protest. I have kept still for years, but really I think

there is no sufficient justification for this sort of thing. What do

you want to celebrate those people for?- those ancestors of yours of

1620- the Mayflower tribe, I mean. What do you want to celebrate

them for? Your pardon: the gentleman at my left assures me that you

are not celebrating the Pilgrims themselves, but the landing of the

Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock on the 22d of December. So you are

celebrating their landing. Why, the other pretext was thin enough, but

this is thinner than ever; the other was tissue, tinfoil,

fish-bladder, but this is gold-leaf. Celebrating their landing! What

was there remarkable about it, I would like to know? What can you be

thinking of? Why, those Pilgrims had been at sea three or four months.

It was the very middle of winter: it was as cold as death off Cape Cod

there. Why shouldn't they come ashore? If they hadn't landed there

would be some reason for celebrating the fact. It would have been a

case of monumental leatherheadedness which the world would not

willingly let die. If it had been you, gentlemen, you probably

wouldn't have landed, but you have no shadow of right to be

celebrating, in your ancestors, gifts which they did not exercise, but

only transmitted. Why, to be celebrating the mere landing of the

Pilgrims- to be trying to make out that this most natural and simple

and customary procedure was an extraordinary circumstance- a

circumstance to be amazed at, and admired, aggrandized and

glorified, at orgies like this for two hundred and sixty years- hang

it, a horse would have known enough to land; a horse- Pardon again;

the gentleman on my right assures me that it was not merely the

landing of the Pilgrims that we are celebrating, but the Pilgrims

themselves. So we have struck an inconsistency here- one says it was

the landing, the other says it was the Pilgrims. It is an

inconsistency characteristic of your intractable and disputatious

tribe, for you never agree about anything but Boston. Well, then, what

do you want to celebrate those Pilgrims for? They were a mighty hard

lot- you know it. I grant you, without the slightest unwillingness,

that they were a deal more gentle and merciful and just than were

the people of Europe of that day; I grant you that they are better

than their predecessors. But what of that?- that is nothing. People

always progress. You are better than your fathers and grandfathers

were (this is the first time I have ever aimed a measureless slander

at the departed, for I consider such things improper). Yes, those

among you who have not been in the penitentiary, if such there be, are

better than your fathers and grandfathers were; but is that any

sufficient reason for getting up annual dinners and celebrating you?

No, by no means- by no means. Well, I repeat, those Pilgrims were a

hard lot. They took good care of themselves, but they abolished

everybody else's ancestors. I am a border-ruffian from the State of

Missouri. I am a Connecticut Yankee by adoption. In me, you have

Missouri morals, Connecticut culture; this, gentlemen, is the

combination which makes the perfect man. But where are my ancestors?

Whom shall I celebrate? Where shall I find the raw material?

My first American ancestor, gentlemen, was an Indian- an early

Indian. Your ancestors skinned him alive, and I am an orphan. Not

one drop of my blood flows in that Indian's veins today. I stand here,

lone and forlorn, without an ancestor. They skinned him! I do not

object to that, if they needed his fur; but alive, gentlemen- alive!

They skinned him alive- and before company! That is what rankles.

Think how he must have felt; for he was a sensitive person and

easily embarrassed. If he had been a bird, it would have been all

right, and no violence done to his feelings, because he would have

been considered "dressed." But he was not a bird, gentlemen, he was

a man, and probably one of the most undressed men that ever was. I ask

you to put yourselves in his place. I ask it as a favor; I ask it as a

tardy act of justice; I ask it in the interest of fidelity to the

traditions of your ancestors; I ask it that the world may contemplate,

with vision unobstructed by disguising swallow-tails and white

cravats, the spectacle which the true New England Society ought to

present. Cease to come to these annual orgies in this hollow modern

mockery- the surplusage of raiment. Come in character; come in the

summer grace, come in the unadorned simplicity, come in the free and

joyous costume which your sainted ancestors provided for mine.

Later ancestors of mine were the Quakers William Robinson, Marmaduke

Stevenson, et al. Your tribe chased them out of the country for

their religion's sake; promised them death if they came back; for your

ancestors had forsaken the homes they loved, and braved the perils

of the sea, the implacable climate, and the savage wilderness, to

acquire that highest and most precious of boons, freedom for every man

on this broad continent to worship according to the dictates of his

own conscience- and they were not going to allow a lot of

pestiferous Quakers to interfere with it. Your ancestors broke forever

the chains of political slavery, and gave the vote to every man in

this wide land, excluding none!- none except those who did not

belong to the orthodox church. Your ancestors- yes, they were a hard

lot; but, nevertheless, they gave us religious liberty to worship as

they required us to worship, and political liberty to vote as the

church required; and so I the bereft one, I the forlorn one, am here

to do my best to help you celebrate them right.

The Quaker woman Elizabeth Hooton was an ancestress of mine. Your

people were pretty severe with her- you will confess that. But, poor

thing! I believe they changed her opinions before she died, and took

her into their fold; and so we have every reason to presume that

when she died she went to the same place which your ancestors went to.

It is a great pity, for she was a good woman. Roger Williams was an

ancestor of mine. I don't really remember what your people did with

him. But they banished him to Rhode Island, anyway. And then, I

believe, recognizing that this was really carrying harshness to an

unjustifiable extreme, they took pity on him and burned him. They were

a hard lot! All those Salem witches were ancestors of mine! Your

people made it tropical for them. Yes, they did; by pressure and the

gallows they made such a clean deal with them that there hasn't been a

witch and hardly a halter in our family from that day to this, and

that is one hundred and eighty-nine years. The first slave brought

into New England out of Africa by your progenitors was an ancestor

of mine- for I am of a mixed breed, an infinitely shaded and exquisite

Mongrel. I'm not one of your sham meerschaums that you can color in

a week. No, my complexion is the patient art of eight generations.

Well, in my own time, I had acquired a lot of my kin- by purchase, and

swapping around, and one way and another- and was getting along very

well. Then, with the inborn perversity of your lineage, you got up a

war, and took them all away from me. And so, again am I bereft,

again am I forlorn; no drop of my blood flows in the veins of any

living being who is marketable.

O my friends, hear me and reform! I seek your good, not mine. You

have heard the speeches. Disband these New England societies-

nurseries of a system of steadily augmenting laudation and hosannaing,

which, if persisted in uncurbed, may some day in the remote future

beguile you into prevaricating and bragging. Oh, stop, stop, while you

are still temperate in your appreciation of your ancestors! Hear me, I

beseech you; get up an auction and sell Plymouth Rock! The Pilgrims

were a simple and ignorant race. They never had seen any good rocks

before, or at least any that were not watched, and so they were

excusable for hopping ashore in frantic delight and clapping an iron

fence around this one. But you, gentlemen, are educated; you are

enlightened; you know that in the rich land of your nativity,

opulent New England, overflowing with rocks, this one isn't worth,

at the outside, more than thirty-five cents. Therefore, sell it,

before it is injured by exposure, or at least throw it open to the

patent-medicine advertisements, and let it earn its taxes.

Yes, hear your true friend- your only true friend- list to his

voice. Disband these societies, hotbeds of vice, of moral decay-

perpetuators of ancestral superstition. Here on this board I see

water, I see milk, I see the wild and deadly lemonade. These are but

steps upon the downward path. Next we shall see tea, then chocolate,

then coffee- hotel coffee. A few more years- all too few, I fear- mark

my words, we shall have cider! Gentlemen, pause ere it be too late.

You are on the broad road which leads to dissipation, physical ruin,

moral decay, gory crime and the gallows! I beseech you, I implore you,

in the name of your anxious friends, in the name of your suffering

families, in the name of your impending widows and orphans, stop ere

it be too late. Disband these New England societies, renounce these

soul-blistering saturnalia, cease from varnishing the rusty

reputations of your long-vanished ancestors- the super-high-moral

old iron-clads of Cape Cod, the pious buccaneers of Plymouth Rock-

go home, and try to learn to behave!

However, chaff and nonsense aside, I think I honor and appreciate

your Pilgrim stock as much as you do yourselves, perhaps; and I

endorse and adopt a sentiment uttered by a grandfather of mine once- a

man of sturdy opinions, of sincere make of mind, and not given to

flattery. He said: "People may talk as they like about that Pilgrim

stock, but, after all's said and done, it would be pretty hard to

improve on those people; and, as for me, I don't mind coming out

flat-footed and saying there ain't any way to improve on them-

except having them born in Missouri!"

COMPLIMENTS AND DEGREES.

DELIVERED AT THE LOTOS CLUB, JANUARY 11, 1908.

In introducing Mr. Clemens, Frank R. Lawrence, the President of

the Lotos Club, recalled the fact that the first club dinner in the

present club-house, some fourteen years ago, was in honor of Mark

Twain.

I WISH to begin this time at the beginning, lest I forget it

altogether; that is to say, I wish to thank you for this welcome

that you are giving, and the welcome which you gave me seven years

ago, and which I forgot to thank you for at that time. I also wish

to thank you for the welcome you gave me fourteen years ago, which I

also forgot to thank you for at the time.

I hope you will continue this custom to give me a dinner every seven

years before I join the hosts in the other world- I do not know

which world.

Mr. Lawrence and Mr. Porter have paid me many compliments. It is

very difficult to take compliments. I do not care whether you

deserve the compliments or not, it is just as difficult to take

them. The other night I was at the Engineers' Club, and enjoyed the

sufferings of Mr. Carnegie. They were complimenting him there; there

it was all compliments, and none of them deserved. They say that you

cannot live by bread alone, but I can live on compliments.

I do not make any pretence that I dislike compliments. The

stronger the better, and I can manage to digest them. I think I have

lost so much by not making a collection of compliments, to put them

away and take them out again once in a while. When in England I said

that I would start to collect compliments, and I began there and I

have brought some of them along.

The first one of these lies- I wrote them down and preserved them- I

think they are mighty good and extremely just. It is one of Hamilton

Mabie's compliments. He said that La Salle was the first one to make a

voyage of the Mississippi, but Mark Twain was the first to chart,

light, and navigate it for the whole world.

If that had been published at the time that I issued that book [Life

on the Mississippi], it would have been money in my pocket. I tell

you, it is a talent by itself to pay compliments gracefully and have

them ring true. It's an art by itself.

Here is another compliment by Albert Bigelow Paine, my biographer.

He is writing four octavo volumes about me, and he has been at my

elbow two and one-half years.

I just suppose that he does not know me, but says he knows me. He

says "Mark Twain is not merely a great writer, a great philosopher,

a great man; he is the supreme expression of the human being, with his

strength and his weakness." What a talent for compression! It takes

a genius in compression to compact as many facts as that.

W. D. Howells spoke of me as first of Hartford, and ultimately of

the solar system, not to say of the universe.

You know how modest Howells is. If it can be proved that my fame

reaches to Neptune and Saturn, that will satisfy even me. You know how

modest and retiring Howells seems to be, but deep down he is as vain

as I am.

Mr. Howells had been granted a degree at Oxford, whose gown was red.

He had been invited to an exercise at Columbia, and upon inquiry had

been told that it was usual to wear the black gown. Later he had found

that three other men wore bright gowns, and he had lamented that he

had been one of the black mass, and not a red torch.

Edison wrote: "The average American loves his family. If he has

any love left over for some other person, he generally selects Mark

Twain."

Now here's the compliment of a little Montana girl which came to

me indirectly. She was in a room in which there was a large photograph

of me. After gazing at it steadily for a time, she said:

"We've got a John the Baptist like that." She also said: "Only

ours has more trimmings."

I suppose she meant the halo. Now here is a gold-miner's compliment.

It is forty-two years old. It was my introduction to an audience to

which I lectured in a log school-house. There were no ladies there.

I wasn't famous then. They didn't know me. Only the miners were there,

with their breeches tucked into their boot-tops and with clay all over

them. They wanted some one to introduce me, and they selected a miner,

who protested, saying:

"I don't know anything about this man. Anyhow, I only know two

things about him. One is, he has never been in jail, and the other is,

I don't know why."

There's one thing I want to say about that English trip. I knew

his Majesty the King of England long years ago, and I didn't meet

him for the first time then. One thing that I regret was that some

newspapers said I talked with the Queen of England with my hat on. I

don't do that with any woman. I did not put it on until she asked me

to. Then she told me to put it on, and it's a command there. I thought

I had carried my American democracy far enough. So I put it on. I have

no use for a hat, and never did have.

Who was it who said that the police of London knew me? Why, the

police know me everywhere. There never was a day over there when a

policeman did not salute me, and then put up his hand and stop the

traffic of the world. They treated me as though I were a duchess.

The happiest experience I had in England was at a dinner given in

the building of the Punch publication, a humorous paper which is

appreciated by all Englishmen. It was the greatest privilege ever

allowed a foreigner. I entered the dining-room of the building,

where those men get together who have been running the paper for

over fifty years. We were about to begin dinner when the toastmaster

said: "Just a minute; there ought to be a little ceremony." Then there

was that meditating silence for a while, and out of a closet there

came a beautiful little girl dressed in pink, holding in her hand a

copy of the previous week's paper, which had in it my cartoon. It

broke me all up. I could not even say "Thank you." That was the

prettiest incident of the dinner, the delight of all that wonderful

table. When she was about to go, I said, "My child, you are not

going to leave me; I have hardly got acquainted with you." She

replied, "You know I've got to go; they never let me come in here

before, and they never will again." That is one of the beautiful

incidents that I cherish.

[At the conclusion of his speech, and while the diners were still

cheering him, Colonel Porter brought forward the red-and-gray gown

of the Oxford "doctor," and Mr. Clemens was made to don it. The diners

rose to their feet in their enthusiasm. With the mortar-board on his

head, and looking down admiringly at himself, Mr. Twain said:]

I like that gown. I always did like red. The redder it is the better

I like it. I was born for a savage. Now, whoever saw any red like

this? There is no red outside the arteries of an archangel that

could compare with this. I know you all envy me. I am going to have

luncheon shortly with ladies- just ladies. I will be the only lady

of my sex present, and I shall put on this gown and make those

ladies look dim.

BOOKS, AUTHORS, AND HATS.

ADDRESS AT THE PILGRIMS' CLUB LUNCHEON, GIVEN

IN HONOR OF MR. CLEMENS AT THE SAVOY

HOTEL, LONDON, JUNE 25, 1907.

Mr. Birrell, M.P., Chief-Secretary for Ireland, in introducing Mr.

Clemens said: "We all love Mark Twain, and we are here to tell him so.

One more point- all the world knows it, and that is why it is

dangerous to omit it- our guest is a distinguished citizen of the

Great Republic beyond the seas. In America his Huckleberry Finn and

his Tom Sawyer are what Robinson Crusoe and Tom Brown's School Days

have been to us. They are racy of the soil. They are books to which it

is impossible to place any period of termination. I will not speak

of the classics- reminiscences of much evil in our early lives. We

do not meet here to-day as critics with our appreciations and

depreciations, our two-penny little prefaces or our forewords. I am

not going to say what the world a thousand years hence will think of

Mark Twain. Posterity will take care of itself, will read what it

wants to read, will forget what it chooses to forget, and will pay

no attention whatsoever to our critical mumblings and jumblings. Let

us therefore be content to say to our friend and guest that we are

here speaking for ourselves and for our children, to say what he has

been to us. I remember in Liverpool, in 1867, first buying the copy,

which I still preserve, of the celebrated Jumping Frog. It had a few

words of preface which reminded me then that our guest in those days

was called 'the wild humorist of the Pacific slope,' and a few lines

later down, 'the moralist of the Main.' That was some forty years ago.

Here he is, still the humorist, still the moralist. His humor enlivens

and enlightens his morality, and his morality is all the better for

his humor. That is one of the reasons why we love him. I am not here

to mention any book of his- that is a subject of dispute in my

family circle, which is the best and which is the next best- but I

must put in a word, lest I should not be true to myself- a terrible

thing- for his Joan of Arc, a book of chivalry, of nobility, and of

manly sincerity for which I take this opportunity of thanking him. But

you can all drink this toast, each one of you with his own

intention. You can get into it what meaning you like. Mark Twain is

a man whom English and Americans do well to honor. He is the true

consolidator of nations. His delightful humor is of the kind which

dissipates and destroys national prejudices. His truth and his

honor, his love of truth, and his love of honor, overflow all

boundaries. He has made the world better by his presence. We rejoice

to see him here. Long may he live to reap the plentiful harvest of

hearty, honest human affection!"

PILGRIMS, I desire first to thank those undergraduates of Oxford.

When a man has grown so old as I am, when he has reached the verge

of seventy-two years, there is nothing that carries him back to the

dreamland of his life, to his boyhood, like recognition of those young

hearts up yonder. And so I thank them out of my heart. I desire to

thank the Pilgrims of New York also for their kind notice and

message which they have cabled over here. Mr. Birrell says he does not

know how he got here. But he will be able to get away all right- he

has not drunk anything since he came here. I am glad to know about

those friends of his, Otway and Chatterton- fresh, new names to me.

I am glad of the disposition he has shown to rescue them from the

evils of poverty, and if they are still in London, I hope to have a

talk with them. For a while I thought he was going to tell us the

effect which my book had upon his growing manhood. I thought he was

going to tell us how much that effect amounted to, and whether it

really made him what he now is, but with the discretion born of

Parliamentary experience he dodged that, and we do not know now

whether he read the book or not. He did that very neatly. I could

not do it any better myself.

My books have had effects, and very good ones, too, here and

there, and some others not so good. There is no doubt about that.

But I remember one monumental instance of it years and years ago.

Professor Norton, of Harvard, was over here, and when he came back

to Boston I went out with Howells to call on him. Norton was allied in

some way by marriage with Darwin. Mr. Norton was very gentle in what

he had to say, and almost delicate, and he said: "Mr. Clemens, I

have been spending some time with Mr. Darwin in England, and I

should like to tell you something connected with that visit. You

were the object of it, and I myself would have been very proud of

it, but you may not be proud of it. At any rate, I am going to tell

you what it was, and to leave to you to regard it as you please. Mr.

Darwin took me up to his bedroom and pointed out certain things there-

pitcher-plants, and so on, that he was measuring and watching from day

to day- and he said: 'The chambermaid is permitted to do what she

pleases in this room, but she must never touch those plants and

never touch those books on that table by that candle. With those books

I read myself to sleep every night.' Those were your own books." I

said: "There is no question to my mind as to whether I should regard

that as a compliment or not. I do regard it as a very great compliment

and a very high honor that that great mind, laboring for the whole

human race, should rest itself on my books. I am proud that he

should read himself to sleep with them."

Now, I could not keep that to myself- I was so proud of it. As

soon as I got home to Hartford I called up my oldest friend- and

dearest enemy on occasion- the Rev. Joseph Twichell, my pastor, and

I told him about that, and, of course, he was full of interest and

venom. Those people who get no compliments like that feel like that.

He went off. He did not issue any applause of any kind, and I did

not hear of that subject for some time. But when Mr. Darwin passed

away from this life, and some time after Darwin's Life and Letters

came out, the Rev. Mr. Twichell procured an early copy of that work

and found something in it which he considered applied to me. He came

over to my house- it was snowing, raining, sleeting, but that did

not make any difference to Twichell. He produced the book, and

turned over and over, until he came to a certain place, when he

said: "Here, look at this letter from Mr. Darwin to Sir Joseph

Hooker." What Mr. Darwin said- I give you the idea and not the very

words- was this: I do not know whether I ought to have devoted my

whole life to these drudgeries in natural history and the other

sciences or not, for while I may have gained in one way I have lost in

another. Once I had a fine perception and appreciation of high

literature, but in me that quality is atrophied. "That was the

reason," said Mr. Twichell, "he was reading your books."

Mr. Birrell has touched lightly- very lightly, but in not an

uncomplimentary way- on my position in this world as a moralist. I

am glad to have that recognition, too, because I have suffered since I

have been in this town; in the first place, right away, when I came

here, from a newsman going around with a great red, highly displayed

placard in the place of an apron. He was selling newspapers, and there

were two sentences on that placard which would have been all right

if they had been punctuated; but they ran those two sentences together

without a comma or anything, and that would naturally create a wrong

impression, because it said, "Mark Twain arrives Ascot Cup stolen." No

doubt many a person was misled by those sentences joined together in

that unkind way. I have no doubt my character has suffered from it.

I suppose I ought to defend my character, but how can I defend it? I

can say here and now- and anybody can see by my face that I am

sincere, that I speak the truth- that I have never seen that Cup. I

have not got the Cup- I did not have a chance to get it. I have always

had a good character in that way. I have hardly ever stolen

anything, and if I did steal anything I had discretion enough to

know about the value of it first. I do not steal things that are

likely to get myself into trouble. I do not think any of us do that. I

know we all take things- that is to be expected- but really, I have

never taken anything, certainly in England, that amounts to any

great thing. I do confess that when I was here seven years ago I stole

a hat, but that did not amount to anything. It was not a good hat, and

was only a clergyman's hat, anyway.

I was at a luncheon party, and Archdeacon Wilberforce was there

also. I dare say he is Archdeacon now- he was a canon then- and he was

serving in the Westminster battery, if that is the proper term- I do

not know, as you mix military and ecclesiastical things together so

much. He left the luncheon table before I did. He began this. I did

steal his hat, but he began by taking mine. I make that interjection

because I would not accuse Archdeacon Wilberforce of stealing my

hat- I should not think of it. I confine that phrase to myself. He

merely took my hat. And with good judgment, too- it was a better hat

than his. He came out before the luncheon was over, and sorted the

hats in the hall, and selected one which suited. It happened to be

mine. He went off with it. When I came out by-and-by there was no

hat there which would go on my head except his, which was left behind.

My head was not the customary size just at that time. I had been

receiving a good many very nice and complimentary attentions, and my

head was a couple of sizes larger than usual, and his hat just

suited me. The bumps and corners were all right intellectually.

There were results pleasing to me- possibly so to him. He found out

whose hat it was, and wrote me saying it was pleasant that all the way

home, whenever he met anybody his gravities, his solemnities, his deep

thoughts, his eloquent remarks were all snatched up by the people he

met, and mistaken for brilliant humorisms.

I had another experience. It was not unpleasing. I was received with

a deference which was entirely foreign to my experience by everybody

whom I met, so that before I got home I had a much higher opinion of

myself than I have ever had before or since. And there is in that very

connection an incident which I remember at that old date which is

rather melancholy to me, because it shows how a person can deteriorate

in a mere seven years. It is seven years ago. I have not that hat now.

I was going down Pall-Mall, or some other of your big streets, and I

recognized that that hat needed ironing. I went into a big shop and

passed in my hat, and asked that it might be ironed. They were

courteous, very courteous, even courtly. They brought that hat back to

me presently very sleek and nice, and I asked how much there was to

pay. They replied that they did not charge the clergy anything. I have

cherished the delight of that moment from that day to this. It was the

first thing I did the other day to go and hunt up that shop and hand

in my hat to have it ironed. I said when it came back, "How much to

pay?" They said, "Ninepence." In seven years I have acquired all

that worldliness, and I am sorry to be back where I was seven years

ago.

But now I am chaffing and chaffing and chaffing here, and I hope you

will forgive me for that; but when a man stands on the verge of

seventy-two you know perfectly well that he never reached that place

without knowing what this life is- heartbreaking bereavement. And so

our reverence is for our dead. We do not forget them; but our duty

is toward the living; and if we can be cheerful, cheerful in spirit,

cheerful in speech and in hope, that is a benefit to those who are

around us.

My own history includes an incident which will always connect me

with England in a pathetic way, for when I arrived here seven years

ago with my wife and my daughter- we had gone around the globe

lecturing to raise money to clear off a debt- my wife and one of my

daughters started across the ocean to bring to England our eldest

daughter. She was twenty-four years of age and in the bloom of young

womanhood, and we were unsuspecting. When my wife and daughter- and my

wife has passed from this life since- when they had reached

mid-atlantic, a cablegram- one of those heartbreaking cablegrams which

we all in our days have to experience- was put into my hand. It stated

that that daughter of ours had gone to her long sleep. And so, as I

say, I cannot always be cheerful, and I cannot always be chaffing; I

must sometimes lay the cap and bells aside, and recognize that I am of

the human race like the rest, and must have my cares and griefs. And

therefore I noticed what Mr. Birrell said- I was so glad to hear him

say it- something that was in the nature of these verses here at the

top of this:

"He lit our life with shafts of sun

And vanquished pain.

Thus two great nations stand as one

In honoring Twain."

I am very glad to have those verses. I am very glad and very

grateful for what Mr. Birrell said in that connection. I have received

since I have been here, in this one week, hundreds of letters from all

conditions of people in England- men, women, and children- and there

is in them compliment, praise, and, above all and better than all,

there is in them a note of affection. Praise is well, compliment is

well, but affection- that is the last and final and most precious

reward that any man can win, whether by character or achievement,

and I am very grateful to have that reward. All these letters make

me feel that here in England- as in America- when I stand under the

English flag, I am not a stranger. I am not an alien, but at home.

DEDICATION SPEECH.

AT THE DEDICATION OF THE COLLEGE OF THE

CITY OF NEW YORK, MAY 14, 1908.

Mr. Clemens wore his gown as Doctor of Laws, Oxford University.

Ambassador Bryce and Mr. Choate had made the formal addresses.

HOW difficult indeed, is the higher education. Mr. Choate needs a

little of it. He is not only short as a statistician of New York,

but he is off, far off, in his mathematics. The four thousand citizens

of Greater New York, indeed!

But I don't think it was wise or judicious on the part of Mr. Choate

to show this higher education he has obtained. He sat in the lap of

that great education (I was there at the time), and see the result-

the lamentable result. Maybe if he had had a sandwich here to

sustain him the result would not have been so serious.

For seventy-two years I have been striving to acquire that higher

education which stands for modesty and diffidence, and it doesn't

work.

And then look at Ambassador Bryce, who referred to his alma mater,

Oxford. He might just as well have included me. Well, I am a later

production.

If I am the latest graduate, I really and sincerely hope I am not

the final flower of its seven centuries; I hope it may go on for seven

ages longer.

DIE SCHRECKEN DER DEUTSCHEN SPRACHE

ADDRESS TO THE VIENNA PRESS CLUB, NOVEMBER 21, 1897,

AS DELIVERED IN GERMAN

ES hat mich tief geruhrt, meine Herren, hier so gastfreundlich

empfangen zu werden, von Kollegen aus meinem eigenen Berufe, in diesem

von meiner eigenen Heimath so weit entferntem Lande. Mein Herz ist

voller Dankbarkeit, aber meine Armuth an deutschen Worten zwingt

mich zu groszer Sparzamkeit des Ausdruckes. Entschuldigen Sie, meine

Herren, dasz ich verlese, was ich Ihnen sagen will. (Er las aber

nicht, Anm. d. Ref.) Die deutsche Sprache spreche ich nicht gut,

doch haben mehrere Sachverstandige mich versichert, dasz ich sie

schreibe wie ein Engel. Mag sein- ich weisz nicht. Habe bis jetzt

keine Bekanntschaften mit Engeln gehabt. Das kommt spater- wenn's

dem lieben Gott gefallt- es hat keine Eile.

Seit lange, meine Herren, habe ich die leidenschaftliche Sehnsucht

gehegt, eine Rede auf Deutsch zu halten, aber man hat mir's nie

erlauben wollen. Leute, die kein Gefuhl fur die Kunst hatten, legten

mir immer Hindernisse in den Weg und vereitelten meinen Wunsch-

zuweilen durch Vorwande, haufig durch Gewalt. Immer sagten diese Leute

zu mir: "Schweigen Sie, Ew. Hochwohlgeboren! Ruhe, um Gotteswillen!

Suche eine andere Art und Weise, Dich lastig zu machen."

Im jetzigen Fall, wie gewohnlich, ist es mir schwierig geworden, mir

die Erlaubnisz zu verschaffen. Das Comite bedauerte sehr, aber es

konnte mir die Erlaubnisz nicht bewilligen wegen eines Gesetzes, das

von der Concordia verlangt, sie soll die deutsche Sprache schnutzen.

Du liebe Zeit! Wieso hatte man mir das sagen konnen- mogen- durfen-

sollen? Ich bin ja der treueste Freund der deutschen Sprache- und

nicht nur jetzt, sondern von lange her- ja vor zwanzig Jahren schon.

Und nie habe ich das Verlangen gehabt, der edlen Sprache zu schaden,

im Gegentheil, nur gewunscht, sie zu verbessern; ich wollte sie blos

reformiren. Es ist der Traum meines Lebens gewesen. Ich habe schon

Besuche bei den verschiedenen deutschen Regierungen abgestattet und um

Kontrakte gebeten. Ich bin jetzt nach Oesterreich in demselben Auftrag

gekommen. Ich wurde nur einige Aenderungen anstreben. Ich wurde blos

die Sprachmethode- die uppige, weitschweifige Konstruktion-

zusammenrucken; die ewige Parenthese unterdrucken, abschaffen,

vernichten; die Einfuhrung von mehr als dreizehn Subjekten in einen

Satz verbieten; das Zeitwort so weit nach vorne rucken, bis man es

ohne Fernrohr entdecken kann. Mit einem Wort, meine Herren, ich mochte

Ihre geliebte Sprache vereinfachen, auf dasz, meine Herren, wenn Sie

sie zum Gebet brauchen, man sie dort oben versteht.

Ich flehe Sie an, von mir sich berathen zu lassen, fuhren Sie

diese erwahnten Reformen aus. Dann werden Sie eine prachtvolle Sprache

besitzen und nachher, wenn Sie Etwas sagen wollen, werden Sie

wenigstens selber verstehen, was Sie gesagt haben. Aber ofters

heutzutage, wenn Sie einen meilen-langen Satz von sich gegeben und Sie

sich etwas angelehnt haben, um auszuruhen, dann mussen Sie eine

ruhrende Neugierde empfinden, selbst herauszubringen, was Sie

eigentlich gesprochen haben. Vor mehreren Tagen hat der

Korrespondent einer hiesigen Zeitung einen Satz zustande gebracht

welcher hundertundzwolf Worte enthielt und darin waren sieben

Parenthese eingeschachtelt und es wurde Das Subjekt siebenmal

gewechselt. Denken Sie nur, meine Herren, im Laufe der Reise eines

einzigen Satzes musz das arme, verfolgte, ermudete Subjekt siebenmal

umsteigen.

Nun, wenn wir die erwahnten Reformen ausfuhren, wird's nicht mehre

so arg sein. Doch noch eins. Ich mochte gern das trennbare Zeitwort

auch ein Bischen reformiren. Ich mochte Niemand thun lassen, was

Schiller gethan: Der hat die ganze Geschichte des dreizigjahrigen

Krieges zwischen die zwei Glieder eines trennbaren Zeitwortes

eingezwangt. Das hat sogar Deutschland selbst emport; und man hat

Schiller die Erlaubnisz verweigert, die Geschichte des hundert

Jahrigen Krieges zu verfassen- Gott sei's gedankt. Nachdem alle

diese Reformen festgestellt sein werden, wird die deutsche Sprache die

edelste und die schonste auf der Welt sein.

Da Ihnen jetzt, meine Herren, der Charackter meiner Mission

bekannt ist, bitte ich Sie, so freundlich zu sein und mir Ihre

werthvolle Hilfe zu schenken. Herr Potzl hat das Publikum glauben

machen wollen, dasz ich nach Wien gekommen bin, um die Brucken zu

verstopfen und den Verkehr zu hindern, wahrend ich Beobachtungen

sammle und aufzeichne. Lassen Sie sich aber nicht von ihm anfuhren.

Meine haufige Anwesenheit auf den Brucken hat einen ganz

unschuldigen Grund. Dort giebt's den nothigen Raum. Dort kann man

einen edlen, langen, deutschen Satz ausdehnen, die Bruckengelander

entlang, und seinen ganzen Inhalt mit einem Blick ubersehen. Auf das

eine Ende des Gelanders klebe ich das erste Glied eines trennbaren

Zeitwortes und das Schluszglied klebe ich an's andere Ende- dann

breite ich den Leib des Satzes dazwischen aus. Gewohnlich sind fur

meinen Zweck die Brucken der Stadt lang genug: wenn ich aber Potzl's

Schriften studiren will, fahre ich hinaus und benutze die herrliche

unendliche Reichsbrucke. Aber das ist eine Verleumdung. Potzl schreibt

das schonste Deutsch. Vielleicht nicht so biegsam wie das meinige,

aber in manchen Kleinigkeiten viel besser. Entschuldigen Sie diese

Schmeicheleien. Die sind wohl verdient. Nun bringe ich meine Rede

um- nein- ich wollte sagen, ich bringe sie zum Schlusz. Ich bin ein

Fremder- aber hier, unter Ihnen, habe ich es ganz vergessen. Und so,

wieder, und noch wieder- biete ich Ihnen meinen herzlichsten Dank!

HORRORS OF THE GERMAN LANGUAGE.

ADDRESS TO THE VIENNA PRESS CLUB, NOVEMBER 21, 1897

[A LITERAL TRANSLATION].

IT has me deeply touched, my gentlemen, here so hospitably

received to be. From colleagues out of my own profession, in this from

my own home so far distant land. My heart is full of gratitude, but my

poverty of German words forces me to greater economy of expression.

Excuse you, my gentlemen, that I read off, what I you say will. [But

he didn't read].

The German language speak I not good, but have numerous connoisseurs

me assured that I her write like an angel. Maybe- maybe- I know not.

Have till now no acquaintance with the angels had. That comes later-

when it the dear God please- it has no hurry.

Since long, my gentlemen, have I the passionate longing nursed a

speech on German to hold, but one has me not permitted. Men, who no

feeling for the art had, laid me ever hindrance in the way and made

naught my desire- sometimes by excuses, often by force. Always said

these men to me: "Keep you still, your Highness! Silence! For God's

sake seek another way and means yourself obnoxious to make."

In the present case, as usual it is me difficult become, for me

the permission to obtain. The committee sorrowed deeply, but could

me the permission not grant on account of a law which from the

Concordia demands she shall the German language protect. Du liebe

Zeit! How so had one to me this say could- might- dared- should? I

am indeed the truest friend of the German language- and not only

now, but from long since- yes, before twenty years already. And

never have I the desire had the noble language to hurt; to the

contrary, only wished she to improve- I would her only reform. It is

the dream of my life been. I have already visits by the various German

governments paid and for contracts prayed. I am now to Austria in

the same task come. I would only some changes effect. I would only the

language method- the luxurious, elaborate construction compress, the

eternal parenthesis suppress, do away with, annihilate; the

introduction of more than thirteen subjects in one sentence forbid;

the verb so far to the front pull that one it without a telescope

discover can. With one word, my gentlemen, I would your beloved

language simplify so that, my gentlemen, when you her for prayer need,

One her yonder-up understands.

I beseech you, from me yourself counsel to let, execute these

mentioned reforms. Then will you an elegant language possess, and

afterward, when you some thing say will, will you at least yourself

understand what you said had. But often nowadays, when you a mile-long

sentence from you given and you yourself somewhat have rested, then

must you have a touching inquisitiveness have yourself to determine

what you actually spoken have. Before several days has the

correspondent of a local paper a sentence constructed which hundred

and twelve words contain, and therein were seven parentheses

smuggled in, and the subject seven times changed. Think you only, my

gentlemen, in the course of the voyage of a single sentence must the

poor, persecuted, fatigued subject seven times change position!

Now, when we the mentioned reforms execute, will it no longer so bad

be. Doch noch eins. I might gladly the separable verb also a little

bit reform. I might none do let what Schiller did: he has the whole

history of the Thirty Years' War between the two members of a

separable verb in-pushed. That has even Germany itself aroused, and

one has Schiller the permission refused the History of the Hundred

Years' War to compose- God be it thanked! After all these reforms

established be will, will the German language the noblest and the

prettiest on the world be.

Since to you now, my gentlemen, the character of my mission known

is, beseech I you so friendly to be and to me your valuable help

grant. Mr. Potzl has the public believed make would that I to Vienna

come am in order the bridges to clog up and the traffic to hinder,

while I observations gather and note. Allow you yourselves but not

from him deceived. My frequent presence on the bridges has an entirely

innocent ground. Yonder gives it the necessary space, yonder can one a

noble long German sentence elaborate, the bridge-railing along, and

his whole contents with one glance overlook. On the one end of the

railing pasted I the first member of a separable verb and the final

member cleave I to the other end- then spread the body of the sentence

between it out! Usually are for my purposes the bridges of the city

long enough; when I but Potzl's writings study will I ride out and use

the glorious endless imperial bridge. But this is a calumny; Potzl

writes the prettiest German. Perhaps not so pliable as the mine, but

in many details much better. Excuse you these flatteries. These are

well deserved.

Now I my speech execute- no, I would say I bring her to the close. I

am a foreigner- but here, under you, have I it entirely forgotten. And

so again and yet again proffer I you my heartiest thanks.

GERMAN FOR THE HUNGARIANS.

ADDRESS AT THE JUBILEE CELEBRATION OF THE

EMANCIPATION OF THE HUNGARIAN PRESS,

MARCH 26, 1899.

The Ministry and members of Parliament were present. The subject was

the "Ausgleich"- i. e., the arrangement for the apportionment of the

taxes between Hungary and Austria. Paragraph 14 of the ausgleich fixes

the proportion each country must pay to the support of the army. It is

the paragraph which caused the trouble and prevented its renewal.

NOW that we are all here together, I think it will be a good idea to

arrange the ausgleich. If you will act for Hungary I shall be quite

willing to act for Austria, and this is the very time for it. There

couldn't be a better, for we are all feeling friendly, fair-minded,

and hospitable now, and full of admiration for each other, full of

confidence in each other, full of the spirit of welcome, full of the

grace of forgiveness, and the disposition to let bygones be bygones.

Let us not waste this golden, this beneficent, this providential

opportunity. I am willing to make any concession you want, just so

we get it settled. I am not only willing to let grain come in free,

I am willing to pay the freight on it, and you may send delegates to

the Reichsrath if you like. All I require is that they shall be quiet,

peaceable people like your own deputies, and not disturb our

proceedings.

If you want the

Gegenseitigengeldbeitragendenverhaltnismassigkeiten rearranged and

readjusted I am ready for that. I will let you off at twenty-eight per

cent.- twenty-seven- even twenty-five if you insist, for there is

nothing illiberal about me when I am out on a diplomatic debauch.

Now, in return for these concessions, I am willing to take

anything in reason, and I think we may consider the business settled

and the ausgleich ausgegloschen at last for ten solid years, and we

will sign the papers in blank, and do it here and now.

Well, I am unspeakably glad to have that ausgleich off my hands.

It has kept me awake nights for anderthalbjahr.

But I never could settle it before, because always when I called

at the Foreign Office in Vienna to talk about it, there wasn't anybody

at home, and that is not a place where you can go in and see for

yourself whether it is a mistake or not, because the person who

takes care of the front door there is of a size that discourages

liberty of action and the free spirit of investigation. To think the

ausgleich is abgemacht at last! It is a grand and beautiful

consummation, and I am glad I came.

The way I feel now I do honestly believe I would rather be just my

own humble self at this moment than paragraph 14.

A NEW GERMAN WORD.

To aid a local charity Mr. Clemens appeared before a fashionable

audience in Vienna, March 10, 1899, reading his sketch "The Lucerne

Girl," and describing how he had been interviewed and ridiculed. He

said in part:

I HAVE not sufficiently mastered German to allow my using it with

impunity. My collection of fourteen-syllable German words is still

incomplete. But I have just added to that collection a jewel- a

veritable jewel. I found it in a telegram from Linz, and it contains

ninety-five letters:

Personaleinkommensteuerschatzungskommissionsmitgliedsreisekosten-

rechnungserganzungsrevisionsfund

If I could get a similar word engraved upon my tombstone I should

sleep beneath it in peace.

UNCONSCIOUS PLAGIARISM.

DELIVERED AT THE DINNER GIVEN BY THE PUBLISHERS OF

"THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY" TO OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES

IN HONOR OF HIS SEVENTIETH BIRTHDAY,

AUGUST 29, 1879.

I WOULD have travelled a much greater distance than I have come to

witness the paying of honors to Doctor Holmes; for my feeling toward

him has always been one of peculiar warmth. When one receives a letter

from a great man for the first time in his life, it is a large event

to him, as all of you know by your own experience. You never can

receive letters enough from famous men afterward to obliterate that

one, or dim the memory of the pleasant surprise it was, and the

gratification it gave you. Lapse of time cannot make it commonplace or

cheap.

Well, the first great man who ever wrote me a letter was our

guest- Oliver Wendell Holmes. He was also the first great literary man

I ever stole anything from- and that is how I came to write to him and

he to me. When my first book was new, a friend of mine said to me,

"The dedication is very neat." Yes, I said, I thought it was. My

friend said, "I always admired it, even before I saw it in The

Innocents Abroad." I naturally said: "What do you mean? Where did

you ever see it before?" "Well, I saw it first some years ago as

Doctor Holmes's dedication to his Songs in Many Keys." Of course, my

first impulse was to prepare this man's remains for burial, but upon

reflection I said I would reprieve him for a moment or two and give

him a chance to prove his assertion if he could. We stepped into a

book-store, and he did prove it. I had really stolen that

dedication, almost word for word. I could not imagine how this curious

thing had happened; for I knew one thing- that a certain amount of

pride always goes along with a teaspoonful of brains, and that this

pride protects a man from deliberately stealing other people's

ideas. That is what a teaspoonful of brains will do for a man- and

admirers had often told me I had nearly a basketful- though they

were rather reserved as to the size of the basket.

However, I thought the thing out, and solved the mystery. Two

years before, I had been laid up a couple of weeks in the Sandwich

Islands, and had read and re-read Doctor Holmes's poems till my mental

reservoir was filled up with them to the brim. The dedication lay on

the top, and handy, so, by-and-by, I unconsciously stole it. Perhaps I

unconsciously stole the rest of the volume, too, for many people

have told me that my book was pretty poetical, in one way or

another. Well, of course, I wrote Doctor Holmes and told him I

hadn't meant to steal, and he wrote back and said in the kindest way

that it was all right and no harm done; and added that he believed

we all unconsciously worked over ideas gathered in reading and

hearing, imagining they were original with ourselves. He stated a

truth, and did it in such a pleasant way, and salved over my sore spot

so gently and so healingly, that I was rather glad I had committed the

crime, for the sake of the letter. I afterward called on him and

told him to make perfectly free with any ideas of mine that struck him

as being good protoplasm for poetry. He could see by that that there

wasn't anything mean about me; so we got along right from the start. I

have not met Doctor Holmes many times since; and lately he said-

However, I am wandering wildly away from the one thing which I got

on my feet to do; that is, to make my compliments to you, my

fellow-teachers of the great public, and likewise to say that I am

right glad to see that Doctor Holmes is still in his prime and full of

generous life; and as age is not determined by years, but by trouble

and infirmities of mind and body, I hope it may be a very long time

yet before any one can truthfully say, "He is growing old."

THE WEATHER.

ADDRESS AT THE NEW ENGLAND SOCIETY'S SEVENTY-FIRST

ANNUAL DINNER, NEW YORK CITY.

The next toast was: "The Oldest Inhabitant- The Weather of New

England."

Who can lose it and forget it?

Who can have it and regret it?

"Be interposer 'twixt us Twain."

-Merchant of Venice.

I REVERENTLY believe that the Maker who made us all makes everything

in New England but the weather. I don't know who makes that, but I

think it must be raw apprentices in the weather-clerk's factory who

experiment and learn how, in New England, for board and clothes, and

then are promoted to make weather for countries that require a good

article, and will take their custom elsewhere if they don't get it.

There is a sumptuous variety about the New England weather that

compels the stranger's admiration- and regret. The weather is always

doing something there; always attending strictly to business; always

getting up new designs and trying them on the people to see how they

will go. But it gets through more business in spring than in any other

season. In the spring I have counted one hundred and thirty-six

different kinds of weather inside of four-and-twenty hours. It was I

that made the fame and fortune of that man that had that marvellous

collection of weather on exhibition at the Centennial, that so

astounded the foreigners. He was going to travel all over the world

and get specimens from all the climes. I said, "Don't you do it; you

come to New England on a favorable spring day." I told him what we

could do in the way of style, variety, and quantity. Well, he came and

he made his collection in four days. As to variety, why, he

confessed that he got hundreds of kinds of weather that he had never

heard of before. And as to quantity- well, after he had picked out and

discarded all that was blemished in any way, he not only had weather

enough, but weather to spare; weather to hire out; weather to sell; to

deposit; weather to invest; weather to give to the poor. The people of

New England are by nature patient and forbearing, but there are some

things which they will not stand. Every year they kill a lot of

poets for writing about "Beautiful Spring." These are generally casual

visitors, who bring their notions of spring from somewhere else, and

cannot, of course, know how the natives feel about spring. And so

the first thing they know the opportunity to inquire how they feel has

permanently gone by. Old Probabilities has a mighty reputation for

accurate prophecy, and thoroughly well deserves it. You take up the

paper and observe how crisply and confidently he checks off what

to-day's weather is going to be on the Pacific, down South, in the

Middle States, in the Wisconsin region. See him sail along in the

joy and pride of his power till he gets to New England, and then see

his tail drop. He doesn't know what the weather is going to be in

New England. Well, he mulls over it, and by-and-by he gets out

something about like this: Probably northeast to southwest winds,

varying to the southward and westward and eastward, and points

between, high and low barometer swapping around from place to place;

probable areas of rain, snow, hail, and drought, succeeded or preceded

by earthquakes, with thunder and lightning. Then he jots down his

postscript from his wandering mind, to cover accidents. "But it is

possible that the programme may be wholly changed in the mean time."

Yes, one of the brightest gems in the New England weather is the

dazzling uncertainty of it. There is only one thing certain about

it: you are certain there is going to be plenty of it- a perfect grand

review; but you never can tell which end of the procession is going to

move first. You fix up for the drought; you leave your umbrella in the

house and sally out, and two to one you get drowned. You make up

your mind that the earthquake is due; you stand from under, and take

hold of something to steady yourself, and the first thing you know you

get struck by lightning. These are great disappointments; but they

can't be helped. The lightning there is peculiar; it is so convincing,

that when it strikes a thing it doesn't leave enough of that thing

behind for you to tell whether- Well, you'd think it was something

valuable, and a Congressman had been there. And the thunder. When

the thunder begins to merely tune up and scrape and saw, and key up

the instruments for the performance, strangers say, "Why, what awful

thunder you have here!" But when the baton is raised and the real

concert begins, you'll find that stranger down in the cellar with

his head in the ash-barrel. Now as to the size of the weather in New

England- lengthways, I mean. It is utterly disproportioned to the size

of that little country. Half the time, when it is packed as full as it

can stick, you will see that New England weather sticking out beyond

the edges and projecting around hundreds and hundreds of miles over

the neighboring States. She can't hold a tenth part of her weather.

You can see cracks all about where she has strained herself trying

to do it. I could speak volumes about the inhuman perversity of the

New England weather, but I will give but a single specimen. I like

to hear rain on a tin roof. So I covered part of my roof with tin,

with an eye to that luxury. Well, sir, do you think it ever rains on

that tin? No, sir; skips it every time. Mind, in this speech I have

been trying merely to do honor to the New England weather- no language

could do it justice. But, after all, there is at least one or two

things about that weather (or, if you please, effects produced by

it) which we residents would not like to part with. If we hadn't our

bewitching autumn foliage, we should still have to credit the

weather with one feature which compensates for all its bullying

vagaries- the ice-storm: when a leafless tree is clothed with ice from

the bottom to the top- ice that is as bright and clear as crystal;

when every bough and twig is strung with ice-beads, frozen

dew-drops, and the whole tree sparkles cold and white, like the Shah

of Persia's diamond plume. Then the wind waves the branches and the

sun comes out and turns all those myriads of beads and drops to prisms

that glow and burn and flash with all manner of colored fires, which

change and change again with inconceivable rapidity from blue to

red, from red to green, and green to gold- the tree becomes a spraying

fountain, a very explosion of dazzling jewels; and it stands there the

acme, the climax, the supremest possibility in art or nature, of

bewildering, intoxicating, intolerable magnificence. One cannot make

the words too strong.

THE BABIES.

DELIVERED AT THE BANQUET, IN CHICAGO, GIVEN

BY THE ARMY OF THE TENNESSEE TO THEIR

FIRST COMMANDER GENERAL U. S.

GRANT, NOVEMBER, 1879.

The fifteenth regular toast was "The Babies.- As they comfort us

in our sorrows, let us not forget them in our festivities."

I LIKE that. We have not all had the good fortune to be ladies. We

have not all been generals, or poets, or statesmen; but when the toast

works down to the babies, we stand on common ground. It is a shame

that for a thousand years the world's banquets have utterly ignored

the baby, as if he didn't amount to anything. If you will stop and

think a minute- if you will go back fifty or one hundred years to your

early married life and recontemplate your first baby- you will

remember that he amounted to a good deal, and even something over. You

soldiers all know that when that little fellow arrived at family

headquarters you had to hand in your resignation. He took entire

command. You became his lackey, his mere body-servant, and you had

to stand around too. He was not a commander who made allowances for

time, distance, weather, or anything else. You had to execute his

order whether it was possible or not. And there was only one form of

marching in his manual of tactics, and that was the double-quick. He

treated you with every sort of insolence and disrespect, and the

bravest of you didn't dare to say a word. You could face the

death-storm at Donelson and Vicksburg, and give back blow for blow;

but when he clawed your whiskers, and pulled your hair, and twisted

your nose, you had to take it. When the thunders of war were

sounding in your ears you set your faces toward the batteries, and

advanced with steady tread; but when he turned on the terrors of his

war-whoop you advanced in the other direction, and mighty glad of

the chance, too. When he called for soothing-syrup, did you venture to

throw out any side-remarks about certain services being unbecoming

an officer and a gentleman? No. You got up and got it. When he ordered

his pap bottle and it was not warm, did you talk back? Not you. You

went to work and warmed it. You even descended so far in your menial

office as to take a suck at that warm, insipid stuff yourself, to

see if it was right- three parts water to one of milk, a touch of

sugar to modify the colic, and a drop of peppermint to kill those

immortal hiccoughs. I can taste that stuff yet. And how many things

you learned as you went along! Sentimental young folks still take

stock in that beautiful old saying that when the baby smiles in his

sleep, it is because the angels are whispering to him. Very pretty,

but too thin- simply wind on the stomach, my friends. If the baby

proposed to take a walk at his usual hour, two o'clock in the morning,

didn't you rise up promptly and remark, with a mental addition which

would not improve a Sunday-school book much, that that was the very

thing you were about to propose yourself? Oh! you were under good

discipline, and as you went fluttering up and down the room in your

undress uniform, you not only prattled undignified baby-talk, but even

tuned up your martial voices and tried to sing!- Rock-a-by Baby in the

Tree-top, for instance. What a spectacle for an Army of the Tennessee!

And what an affliction for the neighbors, too; for it is not everybody

within a mile around that likes military music at three in the

morning. And when you had been keeping this sort of thing up two or

three hours, and your little velvet-head intimated that nothing suited

him like exercise and noise, what did you do? You simply went on until

you dropped in the last ditch. The idea that a baby doesn't amount

to anything! Why, one baby is just a house and a front yard full by

itself. One baby can furnish more business than you and your whole

Interior Department can attend to. He is enterprising, irrepressible,.

brimful of lawless activities. Do what you please, you can't make

him stay on the reservation. Sufficient unto the day is one baby. As

long as you are in your right mind don't you ever pray for twins.

Twins amount to a permanent riot. And there ain't any real

difference between triplets and an insurrection.

Yes, it was high time for a toast-master to recognize the importance

of the babies. Think what is in store for the present crop! Fifty

years from now we shall all be dead, I trust, and then this flag, if

it still survive (and let us hope it may), will be floating over a

Republic numbering 200,000,000 souls, according to the settled laws of

our increase. Our present schooner of State will have grown into a

political leviathan- a Great Eastern. The cradled babies of to-day

will be on deck. Let them be well trained, for we are going to leave a

big contract on their hands. Among the three or four million cradles

now rocking in the land are some which this nation would preserve

for ages as sacred things, if we could know which ones they are. In

one of these cradles the unconscious Farragut of the future is at this

moment teething- think of it!- and putting in a world of dead earnest,

unarticulated, but perfectly justifiable profanity over it, too. In

another the future renowned astronomer is blinking at the shining

Milky Way with but a languid interest- poor little chap!- and

wondering what has become of that other one they call the wet-nurse.

In another the future great historian is lying- and doubtless will

continue to lie until his earthly mission is ended. In another the

future President is busying himself with no profounder problem of

state than what the mischief has become of his hair so early; and in a

mighty array of other cradles there are now some 60,000 future

office-seekers, getting ready to furnish him occasion to grapple

with that same old problem a second time. And in still one more

cradle, somewhere under the flag, the future illustrious

commander-in-chief of the American armies is so little burdened with

his approaching grandeurs and responsibilities as to be giving his

whole strategic mind at this moment to trying to find out some way

to get his big toe into his mouth- an achievement which, meaning no

disrespect, the illustrious guest of this evening turned his entire

attention to some fifty-six years ago; and if the child is but a

prophecy of the man, there are mighty few who will doubt that he

succeeded.

OUR CHILDREN AND GREAT DISCOVERIES.

DELIVERED AT THE AUTHORS' CLUB, NEW YORK.

OUR children- yours-and-mine. They seem like little things to talk

about- our children, but little things often make up the sum of

human life- that's a good sentence. I repeat it, little things often

produce great things. Now, to illustrate, take Sir Isaac Newton- I

presume some of you have heard of Mr. Newton. Well, once when Sir

Isaac Newton- a mere lad- got over into the man's apple orchard- I

don't know what he was doing there- I didn't come all the way from

Hartford to q-u-e-s-t-i-o-n Mr. Newton's honesty- but when he was

there- in the main orchard- he saw an apple fall and he was

a-t-t-racted toward it, and that led to the discovery- not of Mr.

Newton- but of the great law of attraction and gravitation.

And there was once another great discoverer- I've forgotten his

name, and I don't remember what he discovered, but I know it was

something very important, and I hope you will all tell your children

about it when you get home. Well, when the great discoverer was once

loafin' around down in Virginia, and a-puttin' in his time flirting

with Pocahontas- oh! Captain John Smith, that was the man's name-

and while he and Poca were sitting in Mr. Powhatan's garden, he

accidentally put his arm around her and picked something- a simple

weed, which proved to be tobacco- and now we find it in every

Christian family, shedding its civilizing influence broadcast

throughout the whole religious community.

Now there was another great man, I can't think of his name either,

who used to loaf around and watch the great chandelier in the

cathedral at Pisa, which set him to thinking about the great law of

gunpowder, and eventually led to the discovery of the cotton-gin.

Now, I don't say this as an inducement for our young men to loaf

around like Mr. Newton and Mr. Galileo and Captain Smith, but they

were once little babies two days old, and they show what little things

have sometimes accomplished.

EDUCATING THEATRE-GOERS.

The children of the Educational Alliance gave a performance of

"The Prince and the Pauper" on the afternoon of April 14, 1907, in the

theatre of the Alliance Building in East Broadway. The audience was

composed of nearly one thousand children of the neighborhood. Mr.

Clemens, Mr. Howells, and Mr. Daniel Frohman were among the invited

guests.

I HAVE not enjoyed a play so much, so heartily, and so thoroughly

since I played Miles Hendon twenty-two years ago. I used to play in

this piece ("The Prince and the Pauper") with my children, who,

twenty-two years ago, were little youngsters. One of my daughters

was the Prince, and a neighbor's daughter was the Pauper, and the

children of other neighbors played other parts. But we never gave such

a performance as we have seen here to-day. It would have been beyond

us.

My late wife was the dramatist and stage-manager. Our coachman was

the stage-manager, second in command. We used to play it in this

simple way, and the one who used to bring in the crown on a cushion-

he was a little fellow then- is now a clergyman way up high- six or

seven feet high- and growing higher all the time. We played it well,

but not as well as you see it here, for you see it done by practically

trained professionals.

I was especially interested in the scene which we have just had, for

Miles Hendon was my part. I did it as well as a person could who never

remembered his part. The children all knew their parts. They did not

mind if I did not know mine. I could thread a needle nearly as well as

the player did whom you saw to-day. The words of my part I could

supply on the spot. The words of the song that Miles Hendon sang

here I did not catch. But I was great in that song.

[Then Mr. Clemens hummed a bit of doggerel that the reporter made

out as this:

"There was a woman in her town,

She loved her husband well,

But another man just twice as well."

"How is that?" demanded Mr. Clemens. Then resuming:]

It was so fresh and enjoyable to make up a new set of words each

time that I played the part.

If I had a thousand citizens in front of me, I would like to give

them information, but you children already know all that I have

found out about the Educational Alliance. It's like a man living

within thirty miles of Vesuvius and never knowing about a volcano.

It's like living for a lifetime in Buffalo, eighteen miles from

Niagara, and never going to see the Falls. So I had lived in New

York and knew nothing about the Educational Alliance.

This theatre is a part of the work, and furnishes pure and clean

plays. This theatre is an influence. Everything in the world is

accomplished by influences which train and educate. When you get to be

seventy-one and a half, as I am, you may think that your education

is over, but it isn't.

If we had forty theatres of this kind in this city of four millions,

how they would educate and elevate! We should have a body of

educated theatre-goers.

It would make better citizens, honest citizens. One of the best

gifts a millionaire could make would be a theatre here and a theatre

there. It would make of you a real Republic, and bring about an

educational level.

THE EDUCATIONAL THEATRE.

On November 19, 1907, Mr. Clemens entertained a party of six or

seven hundred of his friends, inviting them to witness the

representation of "The Prince and the Pauper," played by boys and

girls of the East Side at the Children's Educational Theatre, New

York.

JUST a word or two to let you know how deeply I appreciate the honor

which the children who are the actors and frequenters of this cozy

playhouse have conferred upon me. They have asked me to be their

ambassador to invite the hearts and brains of New York to come down

here and see the work they are doing. I consider it a grand

distinction to be chosen as their intermediary. Between the children

and myself there is an indissoluble bond of friendship.

I am proud of this theatre and this performance- proud, because I am

naturally vain- vain of myself and proud of the children.

I wish we could reach more children at one time. I am glad to see

that the children of the East Side have turned their backs on the

Bowery theatres to come to see the pure entertainments presented here.

This Children's Theatre is a great educational institution. I hope

the time will come when it will be part of every public school in

the land. I may be pardoned in being vain. I was born vain, I guess.

[At this point the stage-manager's whistle interrupted Mr. Clemens.]

That settles it; there's my cue to stop. I was to talk until the

whistle blew, but it blew before I got started. It takes me longer

to get started than most people. I guess I was born at slow speed.

My time is up, and if you'll keep quiet for two minutes I'll tell

you something about Miss Herts, the woman who conceived this

splendid idea. She is the originator and the creator of this

theatre. Educationally, this institution coins the gold of young

hearts into external good.

[On April 23, 1908, he spoke again at the same place]

I will be strictly honest with you; I am only fit to be honorary

president. It is not to be expected that I should be useful as a

real president. But when it comes to things ornamental I, of course,

have no objection. There is, of course, no competition. I take it as a

very real compliment because there are thousands of children who

have had a part in this request. It is promotion in truth.

It is a thing worth doing that is done here. You have seen the

children play. You saw how little Sally reformed her burglar. She

could reform any burglar. She could reform me. This is the only school

in which can be taught the highest and most difficult lessons- morals.

In other schools the way of teaching morals is revolting. Here the

children who come in thousands live through each part.

They are terribly anxious for the villain to get his bullet, and

that I take to be a humane and proper sentiment. They spend freely the

ten cents that is not saved without a struggle. It comes out of the

candy money, and the money that goes for chewing-gum and other

necessaries of life. They make the sacrifice freely. This is the

only school which they are sorry to leave.

POETS AS POLICEMEN.

Mr. Clemens was one of the speakers at the Lotos Club dinner to

Governor Odell, March 24, 1900. The police problem was referred to

at length.

LET us abolish policemen who carry clubs and revolvers, and put in a

squad of poets armed to the teeth with poems on Spring and Love. I

would be very glad to serve as commissioner, not because I think I

am especially qualified, but because I am too tired to work and

would like to take a rest.

Howells would go well as my deputy. He is tired too, and needs a

rest badly.

I would start in at once to elevate, purify, and depopulate the

red-light district. I would assign the most soulful poets to that

district, all heavily armed with their poems. Take Chauncey Depew as a

sample. I would station them on the corners after they had rounded

up all the depraved people of the district so they could not escape,

and then have them read from their poems to the poor unfortunates. The

plan would be very effective in causing an emigration of the

depraved element.

PUDD'NHEAD WILSON DRAMATIZED.

When Mr. Clemens arrived from Europe in 1895 one of the first things

he did was to see the dramatization of Pudd'nhead Wilson. The audience

becoming aware of the fact that Mr. Clemens was in the house called

upon him for a speech.

NEVER in my life have I been able to make a speech without

preparation, and I assure you that this position in which I find

myself is one totally unexpected.

I have been hemmed in all day by William Dean Howells and other

frivolous persons, and I have been talking about everything in the

world except that of which speeches are constructed. Then, too,

seven days on the water is not conducive to speech-making. I will only

say that I congratulate Mr. Mayhew; he has certainly made a delightful

play out of my rubbish. His is a charming gift. Confidentially I

have always had an idea that I was well equipped to write plays, but I

have never encountered a manager who has agreed with me.

DALY THEATRE.

ADDRESS AT A DINNER AFTER THE ONE HUNDREDTH

PERFORMANCE OF "THE TAMING OF THE SHREW."

Mr. Clemens made the following speech, which he incorporated

afterward in Following the Equator.

I AM glad to be here. This is the hardest theatre in New York to get

into, even at the front door. I never got in without hard work. I am

glad we have got so far in at last. Two or three years ago I had an

appointment to meet Mr. Daly on the stage of this theatre at eight

o'clock in the evening. Well, I got on a train at Hartford to come

to New York and keep the appointment. All I had to do was to come to

the back door of the theatre on Sixth Avenue. I did not believe

that; I did not believe it could be on Sixth Avenue, but that is

what Daly's note said- come to that door, walk right in, and keep

the appointment. It looked very easy. It looked easy enough, but I had

not much confidence in the Sixth Avenue door.

Well, I was kind of bored on the train, and I bought some

newspapers- New Haven newspapers- and there was not much news in them,

so I read the advertisements. There was one advertisement of a

bench-show. I had heard of bench-shows, and I often wondered what

there was about them to interest people. I had seen bench-shows-

lectured to bench-shows, in fact- but I didn't want to advertise

them or to brag about them. Well, I read on a little, and learned that

a bench-show was not a bench-show- but dogs, not benches at all-

only dogs. I began to be interested, and as there was nothing else

to do I read every bit of the advertisement, and learned that the

biggest thing in this show was a St. Bernard dog that weighed one

hundred and forty-five pounds. Before I got to New York I was so

interested in the bench-shows that I made up my mind to go to one

the first chance I got. Down on Sixth Avenue, near where that back

door might be, I began to take things leisurely. I did not like to

be in too much of a hurry. There was not anything in sight that looked

like a back door. The nearest approach to it was a cigar store. So I

went in and bought a cigar, not too expensive, but it cost enough to

pay for any information I might get and leave the dealer a fair

profit. Well, I did not like to be too abrupt, to make the man think

me crazy, by asking him if that was the way to Daly's Theatre, so I

started gradually to lead up to the subject, asking him first if

that was the way to Castle Garden. When I got to the real question,

and he said he would show me the way, I was astonished. He sent me

through a long hallway, and I found myself in a back yard. Then I went

through a long passageway and into a little room, and there before

my eyes was a big St. Bernard dog lying on a bench. There was

another door beyond and I went there, and was met by a big, fierce man

with a fur cap on and coat off, who remarked, "Phwat do yez want?" I

told him I wanted to see Mr. Daly. "Yez can't see Mr. Daly this time

of night," he responded. I urged that I had an appointment with Mr.

Daly, and gave him my card, which did not seem to impress him much.

"Yez can't get in and yez can't shmoke here. Throw away that cigar. If

yez want to see Mr. Daly, yez'll have to be after going to the front

door and buy a ticket, and then if yez have luck and he's around

that way yez may see him." I was getting discouraged, but I had one

resource left that had been of good service in similar emergencies.

Firmly but kindly I told him my name was Mark Twain, and I awaited

results. There was none. He was not fazed a bit. "Phwere's your

order to see Mr. Daly?" he asked. I handed him the note, and he

examined it intently. "My friend," I remarked, "you can read that

better if you hold it the other side up." But he took no notice of the

suggestion, and finally asked: "Where's Mr. Daly's name?" "There it

is," I told him, "on the top of the page." "That's all right," he

said, "that's where he always puts it; but I don't see the 'W' in

his name," and he eyed me distrustfully. Finally he asked, "Phwat do

yez want to see Mr. Daly for?" "Business." "Business?" "Yes." It was

my only hope. "Pwhat kind- theatres?" That was too much. "No." "What

kind of shows, then?" "Bench-shows." It was risky, but I was

desperate. "Bench-shows, is it- where?" The big man's face changed,

and he began to look interested. "New Haven." "New Haven, it is? Ah,

that's going to be a fine show. I'm glad to see you. Did you see a big

dog in the other room?" "Yes." "How much do you think that dog

weighs?" "One hundred and forty-five pounds." "Look at that, now! He's

a good judge of dogs, and no mistake. He weighs all of one hundred and

thirty-eight. Sit down and shmoke- go on and shmoke your cigar, I'll

tell Mr. Daly you are here." In a few minutes I was on the stage

shaking hands with Mr. Daly, and the big man standing around glowing

with satisfaction. "Come around in front," said Mr. Daly, "and see the

performance. I will put you into my own box." And as I moved away I

heard my honest friend mutter, "Well, he desarves it."

THE DRESS OF CIVILIZED WOMAN.

A LARGE part of the daughter of civilization is her dress- as it

should be. Some civilized women would lose half their charm without

dress, and some would lose all of it. The daughter of modern

civilization dressed at her utmost best is a marvel of exquisite and

beautiful art and expense. All the lands, all the climes, and all

the arts are laid under tribute to furnish her forth. Her linen is

from Belfast, her robe is from Paris, her lace is from Venice, or

Spain, or France, her feathers are from the remote regions of Southern

Africa, her furs from the remoter region of the iceberg and the

aurora, her fan from Japan, her diamonds from Brazil, her bracelets

from California, her pearls from Ceylon, her cameos from Rome. She has

gems and trinkets from buried Pompeii, and others that graced comely

Egyptian forms that have been dust and ashes now for forty

centuries. Her watch is from Geneva, her card-case is from China,

her hair is from- from- I don't know where her hair is from; I never

could find out; that is, her other hair- her public hair, her Sunday

hair; I don't mean the hair she goes to bed with....

And that reminds me of a trifle. Any time you want to you can glance

around the carpet of a Pullman car, and go and pick up a hair-pin; but

not to save your life can you get any woman in that car to acknowledge

that hair-pin. Now, isn't that strange? But it's true. The woman who

has never swerved from cast-iron veracity and fidelity in her whole

life will, when confronted with this crucial test, deny her

hair-pin. She will deny that hair-pin before a hundred witnesses. I

have stupidly got into more trouble and more hot water trying to

hunt up the owner of a hair-pin in a Pullman than by any other

indiscretion of my life.

DRESS REFORM AND COPYRIGHT.

When the present copyright law was under discussion, Mr. Clemens

appeared before the committee. He had sent Speaker Cannon the

following letter:

"DEAR UNCLE JOSEPH,- Please get me the thanks of Congress, not

next week but right away. It is very necessary. Do accomplish this for

your affectionate old friend right away- by persuasion if you can,

by violence if you must, for it is imperatively necessary that I get

on the floor of the House for two or three hours and talk to the

members, man by man, in behalf of support, encouragement, and

protection of one of the nation's most valuable assets and industries-

its literature. I have arguments with me- also a barrel with liquid in

it.

"Give me a chance. Get me the thanks of Congress. Don't wait for

others- there isn't time; furnish them to me yourself and let Congress

ratify later. I have stayed away and let Congress alone for

seventy-one years and am entitled to the thanks. Congress knows this

perfectly well, and I have long felt hurt that this quite proper and

earned expression of gratitude has been merely felt by the House and

never publicly uttered.

"Send me an order on the sergeant-at-arms quick. When shall I come?

"With love and a benediction,

"MARK TWAIN."

While waiting to appear before the committee, Mr. Clemens talked

to the reporters:

WHY don't you ask why I am wearing such apparently unseasonable

clothes? I'll tell you. I have found that when a man reaches the

advanced age of seventy-one years, as I have, the continual sight of

dark clothing is likely to have a depressing effect upon him.

Light-colored clothing is more pleasing to the eye and enlivens the

spirit. Now, of course, I cannot compel every one to wear such

clothing just for my especial benefit, so I do the next best thing and

wear it myself.

Of course, before a man reaches my years the fear of criticism might

prevent him from indulging his fancy. I am not afraid of that. I am

decidedly for pleasing color combinations in dress. I like to see

the women's clothes, say, at the opera. What can be more depressing

than the sombre black which custom requires men to wear upon state

occasions? A group of men in evening clothes looks like a flock of

crows, and is just about as inspiring.

After all, what is the purpose of clothing? Are not clothes intended

primarily to preserve dignity and also to afford comfort to their

wearer? Now I know of nothing more uncomfortable than the

present-day clothes of men. The finest clothing made is a person's own

skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this.

The best-dressed man I have ever seen, however, was a native of

the Sandwich Islands who attracted my attention thirty years ago. Now,

when that man wanted to don especial dress to honor a public

occasion or a holiday, why, he occasionally put on a pair of

spectacles. Otherwise the clothing with which God had provided him

sufficed.

Of course, I have ideas of dress reform. For one thing, why not

adopt some of the women's styles? Goodness knows, they adopt enough of

ours. Take the peek-a-boo waist, for instance. It has the obvious

advantages of being cool and comfortable, and in addition it is almost

always made up in pleasing colors which cheer and do not depress.

It is true that I dressed the Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur's

Court in a plug-hat, but, let's see, that was twenty-five years ago.

Then no man was considered fully dressed until he donned a plug-hat.

Nowadays I think that no man is dressed until he leaves it home.

Why, when I left home yesterday they trotted out a plug-hat for me

to wear.

"You must wear it," they told me; "why, just think of going to

Washington without a plug-hat!" But I said no; I would wear a derby or

nothing. Why, I believe I could walk along the streets of New York-

I never do- but still I think I could- and I should never see a

well-dressed man wearing a plug-hat. If I did I should suspect him

of something. I don't know just what, but I would suspect him.

Why, when I got up on the second story of that Pennsylvania

ferry-boat coming down here yesterday I saw Howells coming along. He

was the only man on the boat with a plug-hat, and I tell you he felt

ashamed of himself. He said he had been persuaded to wear it against

his better sense. But just think of a man nearly seventy years old who

has not a mind of his own on such matters!

"Are you doing any work now?" the youngest and most serious reporter

asked.

Work? I retired from work on my seventieth birthday. Since then I

have been putting in merely twenty-six hours a day dictating my

autobiography, which, as John Phoenix said in regard to his autograph,

may be relied upon as authentic, as it is written exclusively by me.

But it is not to be published in full until I am thoroughly dead. I

have made it as caustic, fiendish, and devilish as possible. It will

fill many volumes, and I shall continue writing it until the time

comes for me to join the angels. It is going to be a terrible

autobiography. It will make the hair of some folks curl. But it cannot

be published until I am dead, and the persons mentioned in it and

their children and grand-children are dead. It is something awful!

"Can you tell us the names of some of the notables that are here

to see you off?"

I don't know. I am so shy. My shyness takes a peculiar phase. I

never look a person in the face. The reason is that I am afraid they

may know me and that I may not know them, which makes it very

embarrassing for both of us. I always wait for the other person to

speak. I know lots of people, but I don't know who they are. It is all

a matter of ability to observe things. I never observe anything now. I

gave up the habit years ago. You should keep a habit up if you want to

become proficient in it. For instance, I was a pilot once, but I

gave it up, and I do not believe the captain of the Minneapolis

would let me navigate his ship to London. Still, if I think that he is

not on the job I may go up on the bridge and offer him a few

suggestions.

COLLEGE GIRLS.

Five hundred undergraduates, under the auspices of the Woman's

University Club, New York, welcomed Mr. Clemens as their guest,

April 3, 1906, and gave him the freedom of the club, which the

chairman explained was freedom to talk individually to any girl

present.

I'VE worked for the public good thirty years, so for the rest of

my life I shall work for my personal contentment. I am glad Miss Neron

has fed me, for there is no telling what iniquity I might wander

into on an empty stomach- I mean, an empty mind.

I am going to tell you a practical story about how once upon a

time I was blind- a story I should have been using all these months,

but I never thought about telling it until the other night, and now it

is too late, for on the nineteenth of this month I hope to take formal

leave of the platform forever at Carnegie Hall- that is, take leave so

far as talking for money and for people who have paid money to hear me

talk. I shall continue to infest the platform on these conditions-

that there is nobody in the house who has paid to hear me, that I am

not paid to be heard, and that there will be none but young women

students in the audience. [Here Mr. Clemens told the story of how he

took a girl to the theatre while he was wearing tight boots, which

appears elsewhere in this volume, and ended by saying: "And now let

this be a lesson to you- I don't know what kind of a lesson; I'll

let you think it out."]

GIRLS

GIRLS.

IN my capacity of publisher I recently received a manuscript from

a teacher which embodied a number of answers given by her pupils to

questions propounded. These answers show that the children had nothing

but the sound to go by- the sense was perfectly empty. Here are some

of their answers to words they were asked to define: Auriferous-

pertaining to an orifice; ammonia- the food of the gods; equestrian-

one who asks questions; parasite- a kind of umbrella; ipecac- a man

who likes a good dinner. And here is the definition of an ancient word

honored by a great party: Republican- a sinner mentioned in the Bible.

And here is an innocent deliverance of a zoological kind: "There are a

good many donkeys in the theological gardens." Here also is a

definition which really isn't very bad in its way: Demagogue- a vessel

containing beer and other liquids. Here, too, is a sample of a boy's

composition on girls, which, I must say, I rather like:

"Girls are very stuckup and dignified in their manner and

behaveyour. They think more of dress than anything and like to play

with dowls and rags. They cry if they see a cow in a far distance

and are afraid of guns. They stay at home all the time and go to

church every Sunday. They are al-ways sick. They are al-ways funy

and making fun of boys hands and they say how dirty. They cant play

marbles. I pity them poor things. They make fun of boys and then

turn round and love them. I don't belave they ever killed a cat or

anything. They look out every nite and say, 'Oh, a'nt the moon

lovely!' Thir is one thing I have not told and that is they al-ways

now their lessons bettern boys."

THE LADIES.

DELIVERED AT THE ANNIVERSARY FESTIVAL, 1872,

OF THE SCOTTISH CORPORATION OF LONDON

Mr. Clemens replied to the toast "The Ladies."

I AM proud, indeed, of the distinction of being chosen to respond to

this especial toast, to "The Ladies," or to women if you please, for

that is the preferable term, perhaps; it is certainly the older, and

therefore the more entitled to reverence. I have noticed that the

Bible, with that plain, blunt honesty which is such a conspicuous

characteristic of the Scriptures, is always particular to never

refer to even the illustrious mother of all mankind as a "lady," but

speaks of her as a woman. It is odd, but you will find it is so. I

am peculiarly proud of this honor, because I think that the toast to

women is one which, by right and by every rule of gallantry, should

take precedence of all others- of the army, of the navy, of even

royalty itself- perhaps, though the latter is not necessary in this

day and in this land, for the reason that, tacitly, you do drink a

broad general health to all good women when you drink the health of

the Queen of England and the Princess of Wales. I have in mind a

poem just now which is familiar to you all, familiar to everybody. And

what an inspiration that was, and how instantly the present toast

recalls the verses to all our minds when the most noble, the most

gracious, the purest, and sweetest of all poets says:

"Woman! O woman!- er-

Wom-"

However, you remember the lines; and you remember how feelingly, how

daintily, how almost imperceptibly the verses raise up before you,

feature by feature, the ideal of a true and perfect woman; and how, as

you contemplate the finished marvel, your homage grows into worship of

the intellect that could create so fair a thing out of mere breath,

mere words. And you call to mind now, as I speak, how the poet, with

stern fidelity to the history of all humanity, delivers this beautiful

child of his heart and his brain over to the trials and sorrows that

must come to all, sooner or later, that abide in the earth, and how

the pathetic story culminates in that apostrophe- so wild, so

regretful, so full of mournful retrospection. The lines run thus:

"Alas!- alas!- a- alas!

--Alas!---- alas!"

- and so on. I do not remember the rest; but, taken together, it seems

to me that poem is the noblest tribute to woman that human genius

has ever brought forth- and I feel that if I were to talk hours I

could not do my great theme completer or more graceful justice than

I have now done in simply quoting that poet's matchless words. The

phases of the womanly nature are infinite in their variety. Take any

type of woman, and you shall find in it something to respect,

something to admire, something to love. And you shall find the whole

joining you heart and hand. Who was more patriotic than Joan of Arc?

Who was braver? Who has given us a grander instance of

self-sacrificing devotion? Ah! you remember, you remember well, what a

throb of pain, what a great tidal wave of grief swept over us all when

Joan of Arc fell at Waterloo. Who does not sorrow for the loss of

Sappho, the sweet. singer of Israel? Who among us does not miss the

gentle ministrations, the softening influences, the humble piety of

Lucretia Borgia? Who can join in the heartless libel that says woman

is extravagant in dress when he can look back and call to mind our

simple and lowly mother Eve arrayed in her modification of the

Highland costume? Sir, women have been soldiers, women have been

painters, women have been poets. As long as language lives the name of

Cleopatra will live. And not because she conquered George III.- but

because she wrote those divine lines:

"Let dogs delight to bark and bite,

For God hath made them so."

The story of the world is adorned with the names of illustrious ones

of our own sex- some of them sons of St. Andrew, too- Scott, Bruce,

Burns, the warrior Wallace, Ben Nevis- the gifted Ben Lomond, and

the great new Scotchman, Ben Disraeli. Out of the great plains of

Mr. Benjamin Disraeli, at that time Prime Minister of England, had

just been elected Lord Rector of Glasgow University, and had made a

speech which gave rise to a world of discussion.

WOMAN'S PRESS CLUB.

On October 27, 1900, the New York Woman's Press Club gave a tea in

Carnegie Hall. Mr. Clemens was the guest of honor.

IF I were asked an opinion I would call this an ungrammatical

nation. There is no such thing as perfect grammar, and I don't

always speak good grammar myself. But I have been foregathering for

the past few days with professors of American universities, and I've

heard them all say things like this: "He don't like to do it."

[There was a stir.] Oh, you'll hear that to-night if you listen, or,

"He would have liked to have done it." You'll catch some educated

Americans saying that. When these men take pen in hand they write with

as good grammar as any. But the moment they throw the pen aside they

throw grammatical morals aside with it.

To illustrate the desirability and possibility of concentration, I

must tell you a story of my little six-year-old daughter. The

governess had been teaching her about the reindeer, and, as the custom

was, she related it to the family. She reduced the history of that

reindeer to two or three sentences when the governess could not have

put it into a page. She said: "The reindeer is a very swift animal.

A reindeer once drew a sled four hundred miles in two hours." She

appended the comment: "This was regarded as extraordinary." And

concluded: "When that reindeer was done drawing that sled four hundred

miles in two hours it died."

As a final instance of the force of limitations in the development

of concentration, I must mention that beautiful creature, Helen

Keller, whom I have known for these many years. I am filled with the

wonder of her knowledge, acquired because shut out from all

distraction. If I could have been deaf, dumb, and blind I also might

have arrived at something.

VOTES FOR WOMEN.

AT THE ANNUAL MEETING OF THE HEBREW TECHNICAL

SCHOOL FOR GIRLS, HELD IN THE TEMPLE

EMMANUEL, JANUARY 20, 1901

Mr. Clemens was introduced by President Meyer, who said: "In one

of Mr. Clemens's works he expressed his opinion of men, saying he

had no choice between Hebrew and Gentile, black men or white; to him

all men were alike. But I never could find that he expressed his

opinion of women; perhaps that opinion was so exalted that he could

not express it. We shall now be called to hear what he thinks of

women."

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,- It is a small help that I can afford, but

it is just such help that one can give as coming from the heart

through the mouth. The report of Mr. Meyer was admirable, and I was as

interested in it as you have been. Why, I'm twice as old as he, and

I've had so much experience that I would say to him, when he makes his

appeal for help: "Don't make it for to-day or to-morrow, but collect

the money on the spot."

We are all creatures of sudden impulse. We must be worked up by

steam, as it were. Get them to write their wills now, or it may be too

late by-and-by. Fifteen or twenty years ago I had an experience I

shall never forget. I got into a church which was crowded by a

sweltering and panting multitude. The city missionary of our town-

Hartford- made a telling appeal for help. He told of personal

experiences among the poor in cellars and top lofts requiring

instances of devotion and help. The poor are always good to the

poor. When a person with his millions gives a hundred thousand dollars

it makes a great noise in the world, but he does not miss it; it's the

widow's mite that makes no noise but does the best work.

I remember on that occasion in the Hartford church the collection

was being taken up. The appeal had so stirred me that I could hardly

wait for the hat or plate to come my way. I had four hundred dollars

in my pocket, and I was anxious to drop it in the plate and wanted

to borrow more. But the plate was so long in coming my way that the

fever-heat of beneficence was going down lower and lower- going down

at the rate of a hundred dollars a minute. The plate was passed too

late. When it finally came to me, my enthusiasm had gone down so

much that I kept my four hundred dollars- and stole a dime from the

plate. So, you see, time sometimes leads to crime.

Oh, many a time have I thought of that and regretted it, and I

adjure you all to give while the fever is on you.

Referring to woman's sphere in life, I'll say that woman is always

right. For twenty-five years I've been a woman's rights man. I have

always believed, long before my mother died, that, with her gray hairs

and admirable intellect, perhaps she knew as much as I did. Perhaps

she knew as much about voting as I.

I should like to see the time come when women shall help to make the

laws. I should like to see that whip-lash, the ballot, in the hands of

women. As for this city's government, I don't want to say much, except

that it is a shame- a shame; but if I should live twenty-five years

longer- and there is no reason why I shouldn't- I think I'll see women

handle the ballot. If women had the ballot to-day, the state of things

in this town would not exist.

If all the women in this town had a vote to-day they would elect a

mayor at the next election, and they would rise in their might and

change the awful state of things now existing here.

WOMAN- AN OPINION.

ADDRESS AT AN EARLY BANQUET OF THE

WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENTS' CLUB.

The twelfth toast was as follows: "Woman- The pride of any

profession, and the jewel of ours."

MR. PRESIDENT,- I do not know why I should be singled out to receive

the greatest distinction of the evening- for so the office of replying

to the toast of woman has been regarded in every age. I do not know

why I have received this distinction, unless it be that I am a

trifle less homely than the other members of the club. But be this

as it may, Mr. President, I am proud of the position, and you could

not have chosen any one who would have accepted it more gladly, or

labored with a heartier good-will to do the subject justice than I-

because, sir, I love the sex. I love all the women, irrespective of

age or color.

Human intellect cannot estimate what we owe to woman, sir. She

sews on our buttons; she mends our clothes; she ropes us in at the

church fairs; she confides in us she tells us whatever she can find

out about the little private affairs of the neighbors; she gives us

good advice, and plenty of it; she soothes our aching brows; she bears

our children- ours as a general thing. In all relations of life,

sir, it is but a just and graceful tribute to woman to say of her that

she is a brick.

Wheresoever you place woman, sir- in whatever position or estate-

she is an ornament to the place she occupies, and a treasure to the

world. [Here Mr. Clemens paused, looked inquiringly at his hearers,

and remarked that the applause should come in at this point. It came

in. He resumed his eulogy.] Look at Cleopatra!- look at Desdemona!-

look at Florence Nightingale!- look at Joan of Arc!- look at

Lucretia Borgia! [Disapprobation expressed.] Well [said Mr. Clemens,

scratching his head, doubtfully], suppose we let Lucretia slide.

Look at Joyce Heth!- Look at Mother Eve! You need not look at her

unless you want to, but [said Mr. Clemens, reflectively, after a

pause] Eve was ornamental, sir- particularly before the fashions

changed. I repeat, sir, look at the illustrious names of history. Look

at the Widow Machree!- Look at Lucy Stone!- look at Elizabeth Cady

Stanton!- Look at George Francis Train! And, sir, I say it with

bowed head and deepest veneration- look at the mother of Washington!

She raised a boy that could not tell a lie- could not tell a lie!

But he never had any chance. It might have been different if he had

belonged to the Washington Newspaper Correspondents' Club.

I repeat, sir, that in whatever position you place a woman she is an

ornament to society and a treasure to the world. As a sweetheart,

she has few equals and no superiors; as a cousin, she is convenient;

as a wealthy grandmother with an incurable distemper, she is precious;

as a wet-nurse, she has no equal among men.

What, sir, would the people of the earth be without woman? They

would be scarce, sir, almighty scarce. Then let us cherish her; let us

protect her; let us give her our support, our encouragement, our

sympathy, ourselves- if we get a chance.

But, jesting aside, Mr. President, woman is lovable, gracious,

kind of heart, beautiful- worthy of all respect, of all esteem, of all

deference. Not any here will refuse to drink her health right

cordially in this bumper of wine, for each and every one has

personally known, and loved, and honored the very best one of them

all- his own mother.

ADVICE TO GIRLS.

In 1907 a young girl whom Mr. Clemens met on the steamer Minnehaha

called him "grandpa," and he called her his granddaughter. She was

attending St. Timothy's School, at Catonsville, Maryland, and Mr.

Clemens promised her to see her graduate. He accordingly made the

journey from New York on June 10, 1909, and delivered a short address.

I DON'T know what to tell you girls to do. Mr. Martin has told you

everything you ought to do, and now I must give you some don'ts.

There are three things which come to my mind which I consider

excellent advice:

First, girls, don't smoke- that is, don't smoke to excess. I am

seventy-three and a half years old, and have been smoking

seventy-three of them. But I never smoke to excess- that is, I smoke

in moderation, only one cigar at a time.

Second, don't drink- that is, don't drink to excess.

Third, don't marry- I mean, to excess.

Honesty is the best policy. That is an old proverb; but you don't

want ever to forget it in your journey through life.

TAXES AND MORALS.

ADDRESS DELIVERED IN NEW YORK, JANUARY 22, 1906.

At the twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of Tuskeegee

Institute by Booker T. Washington, Mr. Choate presided, and in

introducing Mr. Clemens made fun of him because he made play his work,

and that when he worked hardest he did so lying in bed.

I CAME here in the responsible capacity of policeman to watch Mr.

Choate. This is an occasion of grave and serious importance, and it

seems necessary for me to be present, so that if he tried to work

off any statement that required correction, reduction, refutation,

or exposure, there would be a tried friend of the public to protect

the house. He has not made one statement whose veracity fails to tally

exactly with my own standard. I have never seen a person improve so.

This makes me thankful and proud of a country that can produce such

men- two such men. And all in the same country. We can't be with you

always; we are passing away, and then- well, everything will have to

stop, I reckon. It is a sad thought. But in spirit I shall still be

with you. Choate, too- if he can.

Every born American among the eighty millions, let his creed or

destitution of creed be what it may, is indisputably a Christian to

this degree- that his moral constitution is Christian.

There are two kinds of Christian morals, one private and the other

public. These two are so distinct, so unrelated, that they are no more

akin to each other than are archangels and politicians. During three

hundred and sixty-three days in the year the American citizen is

true to his Christian private morals, and keeps undefiled the nation's

character at its best and highest; then in the other two days of the

year he leaves his Christian private morals at home and carries his

Christian public morals to the tax office and the polls, and does

the best he can to damage and undo his whole year's faithful and

righteous work. Without a blush he will vote for an unclean boss if

that boss is his party's Moses, without compunction he will vote

against the best man in the whole land if he is on the other ticket.

Every year in a number of cities and States he helps put corrupt men

in office, whereas if he would but throw away his Christian public

morals, and carry his Christian private morals to the polls, he

could promptly purify the public service and make the possession of

office a high and honorable distinction.

Once a year he lays aside his Christian private morals and hires a

ferry-boat and piles up his bonds in a warehouse in New Jersey for

three days, and gets out his Christian public morals and goes to the

tax office and holds up his hands and swears he wishes he may never-

never if he's got a cent in the world, so help him. The next day the

list appears in the papers- a column and a quarter of names, in fine

print, and every man in the list a billionaire and member of a

couple of churches. I know all those people. I have friendly,

social, and criminal relations with the whole lot of them. They

never miss a sermon when they are so's to be around, and they never

miss swearing-off day, whether they are so's to be around or not.

I used to be an honest man. I am crumbling. No- I have crumbled.

When they assessed me at $75,000 a fortnight ago I went out and

tried to borrow the money, and couldn't; then when I found they were

letting a whole crop of millionaires live in New York at a third of

the price they were charging me I was hurt, I was indignant, and said:

"This is the last feather. I am not going to run this town all by

myself." In that moment- in that memorable moment- I began to crumble.

In fifteen minutes the disintegration was complete. In fifteen minutes

I had become just a mere moral sand-pile; and I lifted up my hand

along with those seasoned and experienced deacons and swore off

every rag of personal property I've got in the world, clear down to

cork leg, glass eye, and what is left of my wig.

Those tax officers were moved; they were profoundly moved. They

had long been accustomed to seeing hardened old grafters act like

that, and they could endure the spectacle; but they were expecting

better things of me, a chartered, professional moralist, and they were

saddened.

I fell visibly in their respect and esteem, and I should have fallen

in my own, except that I had already struck bottom, and there wasn't

any place to fall to.

At Tuskeegee they will jump to misleading conclusions from

insufficient evidence, along with Doctor Parkhurst, and they will

deceive the student with the superstition that no gentleman ever

swears.

Look at those good millionaires; aren't they gentlemen? Well, they

swear. Only once in a year, maybe, but there's enough, bulk to it to

make up for the lost time. And do they lose anything by it? No, they

don't; they save enough in three minutes to support the family seven

years. When they swear, do we shudder? No- unless they say "damn!"

Then we do. It shrivels us all up. Yet we ought not to feel so about

it, because we all swear- everybody. Including the ladies. Including

Doctor Parkhurst, that strong and brave and excellent citizen, but

superficially educated.

For it is not the word that is the sin, it is the spirit back of the

word. When an irritated lady says "oh!" the spirit back of it is

"damn!" and that is the way it is going to be recorded against her. It

always makes me so sorry when I hear a lady swear like that. But if

she says "damn," and says it in an amiable, nice way, it isn't going

to be recorded at all.

The idea that no gentleman ever swears is all wrong; he can swear

and still be a gentleman if he does it in a nice and benevolent and

affectionate way. The historian, John Fiske, whom I knew well and

loved, was a spotless and most noble and upright Christian

gentleman, and yet he swore once. Not exactly that, maybe; still,

he- but I will tell you about it.

One day, when he was deeply immersed in his work, his wife came

in, much moved and profoundly distressed, and said: "I am sorry to

disturb you, John, but I must, for this is a serious matter, and needs

to be attended to at once."

Then, lamenting, she brought a grave accusation against their little

son. She said: "He has been saying his Aunt Mary is a fool and his

Aunt Martha is a damned fool." Mr. Fiske reflected upon the matter a

minute, then said: "Oh, well, it's about the distinction I should make

between them myself."

Mr. Washington, I beg you to convey these teachings to your great

and prosperous and most beneficent educational institution, and add

them to the prodigal mental and moral riches wherewith you equip

your fortunate proteges for the struggle of life.

TAMMANY AND CROKER.

Mr. Clemens made his debut as a campaign orator on October 7,

1901, advocating the election of Seth Low for Mayor, not as a

Republican, but as a member of the "Acorns," which he described as a

"third party having no political affiliation, but was concerned only

in the selection of the best candidates and the best member."

GREAT BRITAIN had a Tammany and a Croker a good while ago. This

Tammany was in India, and it began its career with the spread of the

English dominion after the Battle of Plassey. Its first boss was

Clive, a sufficiently crooked person sometimes, but straight as a

yardstick when compared with the corkscrew crookedness of the second

boss, Warren Hastings.

That old-time Tammany was the East India Company's government, and

had its headquarters at Calcutta. Ostensibly it consisted of a Great

Council of four persons, of whom one was the Governor-General,

Warren Hastings; really it consisted of one person- Warren Hastings;

for by usurpation he concentrated all authority in himself and

governed the country like an autocrat.

Ostensibly the Court of Directors, sitting in London and

representing the vast interests of the stockholders, was supreme in

authority over the Calcutta Great Council, whose membership it

appointed and removed at pleasure, whose policies it dictated, and

to whom it conveyed its will in the form of sovereign commands; but

whenever it suited Hastings, he ignored even that august body's

authority and conducted the mighty affairs of the British Empire in

India to suit his own notions.

At his mercy was the daily bread of every official, every trader,

every clerk, every civil servant, big and little, in the whole huge

India Company's machine, and the man who hazarded his bread by any

failure of subserviency to the boss lost it.

Now then, let the supreme masters of British India, the giant

corporation of the India Company of London, stand for the voters of

the city of New York; let the Great Council of Calcutta stand for

Tammany; let the corrupt and money-grubbing great hive of serfs

which served under the Indian Tammany's rod stand for New York

Tammany's serfs; let Warren Hastings stand for Richard Croker, and

it seems to me that the parallel is exact and complete. And so let

us be properly grateful and thank God and our good luck that we didn't

invent Tammany.

Edmund Burke, regarded by many as the greatest orator of all

times, conducted the case against Warren Hastings in that renowned

trial which lasted years, and which promises to keep its renown for

centuries to come. I wish to quote some of the things he said. I

wish to imagine him arrainging Mr. Croker and Tammany before the

voters of New York City and pleading with them for the overthrow of

that combined iniquity of the 5th of November, and will substitute for

"My Lords," read "Fellow-Citizens"; for "Kingdom," read "City"; for

"Parliamentary Process," read "Political Campaign"; for "Two

Houses," read "Two Parties," and so it reads:

"Fellow-citizens, I must look upon it as an auspicious

circumstance to this cause, in which the honor of the city is

involved, that from the first commencement of our political campaign

to this the hour of solemn trial not the smallest difference of

opinion has arisen between the two parties.

"You will see, in the progress of this cause, that there is not only

a long, connected, systematic series of misdemeanors, but an equally

connected system of maxims and principles invented to justify them.

Upon both of these you must judge.

"It is not only the interest of the city of New York, now the most

considerable part of the city of the Americans, which is concerned,

but the credit and honor of the nation itself will be decided by

this decision."

At a later meeting of the Acorn Club, Mr. Clemens said:

Tammany is dead, and there's no use in blackguarding a corpse.

The election makes me think of a story of a man who was dying. He

had only two minutes to live, so he sent for a clergyman and asked

him, "Where is the best place to go to?" He was undecided about it. So

the minister. told him that each place had its advantages- heaven

for climate, and hell for society.

MUNICIPAL CORRUPTION.

ADDRESS AT THE CITY CLUB DINNER, JANUARY 4, 1901.

Bishop Potter told how an alleged representative of Tammany Hall

asked him in effect if he would cease his warfare upon the Police

Department if a certain captain and inspector were dismissed. He

replied that he would never be satisfied until the "man at the top"

and the "system" which permitted evils in the Police Department were

crushed.

THE Bishop has just spoken of a condition of things which none of us

can deny, and which ought not to exist; that is, the lust of gain- a

lust which does not stop short of the penitentiary or the jail to

accomplish its ends. But we may be sure of one thing, and that is that

this sort of thing is not universal. If it were, this country would

not be. You may put this down as a fact: that out of every fifty

men, forty-nine are clean. Then why is it, you may ask, that the

forty-nine don't have things the way they want them? I'll tell you why

it is. A good deal has been said here to-night about what is to be

accomplished by organization. That's just the thing. It's because

the fiftieth fellow and his pals are organized and the other

forty-nine are not that the dirty one rubs it into the clean fellows

every time.

You may say organize, organize, organize; but there may be so much

organization that it will interfere with the work to be done. The

Bishop here had an experience of that sort, and told all about it

down-town the other night. He was painting a barn- it was his own

barn- and yet he was informed that his work must stop; he was a

non-union painter, and couldn't continue at that sort of job.

Now, all these conditions of which you complain should be

remedied, and I am here to tell you just how to do it. I've been a

statesman without salary for many years, and I have accomplished great

and widespread good. I don't know that it has benefited anybody very

much, even if it was good; but I do know that it hasn't harmed me very

much, and is hasn't made me any richer.

We hold the balance of power. Put up your best men for office, and

we shall support the better one. With the election of the best man for

Mayor would follow the selection of the best man for Police

Commissioner and Chief of Police.

My first lesson in the craft of statesmanship was taken at an

early age. Fifty-one years ago I was fourteen years old, and we had

a society in the town I lived in, patterned after the Free-masons,

or the Ancient Order of United Farmers, or some such thing- just

what it was patterned after doesn't matter. It had an inside guard and

an outside guard, and a past-grand warden, and a lot of such things,

so as to give dignity to the organization and offices to the members.

Generally speaking it was a pretty good sort of organization, and

some of the very best boys in the village, including- but I mustn't

get personal on an occasion like this- and the society would have

got along pretty well had it not been for the fact that there were a

certain number of the members who could be bought. They got to be an

infernal nuisance. Every time we had an election the candidates had to

go around and see the purchasable members. The price per vote was paid

in doughnuts, and it depended somewhat on the appetites of the

individuals as to the price of the votes.

This thing ran along until some of us, the really very best boys

in the organization, decided that these corrupt practices must stop,

and for the purpose of stopping them we organized a third party. We

had a name, but we were never known by that name. Those who didn't

like us called us the Anti-Doughnut party, but we didn't mind that.

We said: "Call us what you please; the name doesn't matter. We are

organized for a principle." By-and-by the election came around, and we

made a big mistake. We were triumphantly beaten. That taught us a

lesson. Then and there we decided never again to nominate anybody

for anything. We decided simply to force the other two parties in

the society to nominate their very best men. Although we were

organized for a principle, we didn't care much about that.

Principles aren't of much account anyway, except at election-time.

After that you hang them up to let them season.

The next time we had an election we told both the other parties that

we'd beat any candidates put up by any one of them of whom we didn't

approve. In that election we did business. We got the man we wanted. I

suppose they called us the Anti-Doughnut party because they couldn't

buy us with their doughnuts. They didn't have enough of them. Most

reformers arrive at their price sooner or later, and I suppose we

would have had our price; but our opponents weren't offering

anything but doughnuts, and those we spurned.

Now it seems to me that an Anti-Doughnut party is just what is

wanted in the present emergency. I would have the Anti-Doughnuts

felt in every city and hamlet and school district in this State and in

the United States. I was an Anti-Doughnut in my boyhood, and I'm an

Anti-Doughnut still. The modern designation is Mugwump. There used

to be quite a number of us Mugwumps, but I think I'm the only one

left. I had a vote this fall, and I began to make some inquiries as to

what I had better do with it.

I don't know anything about finance, and I never did, but I know

some pretty shrewd financiers, and they told me that Mr. Bryan

wasn't safe on any financial question. I said to myself, then, that it

wouldn't do for me to vote for Bryan, and I rather thought- I know

now- that McKinley wasn't just right on this Philippine question,

and so I just didn't vote for anybody. I've got that vote yet, and

I've kept it clean, ready to deposit at some other election. It wasn't

cast for any wildcat financial theories, and it wasn't cast to support

the man who sends our boys as volunteers out into the Philippines to

get shot down under a polluted flag.

MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT.

ADDRESS AT THE ANNUAL DINNER OF THE ST. NICHOLAS

SOCIETY, NEW YORK, DECEMBER 6, 1900.

Doctor Mackay, in his response to the toast "St. Nicholas," referred

to Mr. Clemens, saying: "Mark Twain is as true a preacher of true

righteousness as any bishop, priest, or minister of any church to-day,

because he moves men to forget their faults by cheerful well-doing

instead of making them sour and morbid by everlastingly bending

their attention to the seamy and sober side of life."

MR. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN OF THE ST. NICHOLAS SOCIETY,- These

are, indeed, prosperous days for me. Night before last, in a speech,

the Bishop of the Diocese of New York complimented me for my

contribution to theology, and to-night the Reverend Doctor Mackay

has elected me to the ministry. I thanked Bishop Potter then for his

compliment, and I thank Doctor Mackay now for that promotion. I

think that both have discerned in me what I long ago discerned, but

what I was afraid the world would never learn to recognize.

In this absence of nine years I find a great improvement in the city

of New York. I am glad to speak on that as a toast- "The City of New

York." Some say it has improved because I have been away. Others,

and I agree with them, say it has improved because I have come back.

We must judge of a city, as of a man, by its external appearances

and by its inward character. In externals the foreigner coming to

these shores is more impressed at first by our sky-scrapers. They

are new to him. He has not done anything of the sort since he built

the tower of Babel. The foreigner is shocked by them.

In the daylight they are ugly. They are- well, too chimneyfied and

too snaggy- like a mouth that needs attention from a dentist; like a

cemetery that is all monuments and no gravestones. But at night,

seen from the river where they are columns towering against the sky,

all sparkling with light, they are fairylike; they are beauty more

satisfactory to the soul and more enchanting than anything that man

has dreamed of since the Arabian nights. We can't always have the

beautiful aspect of things. Let us make the most of our sights that

are beautiful and let the others go. When your foreigner makes

disagreeable comments on New York by daylight, float him down the

river at night.

What has made these sky-scrapers possible is the elevator. The

cigar-box which the European calls a "lift" needs but to be compared

with our elevators to be appreciated. The lift stops to reflect

between floors. That is all right in a hearse, but not in elevators.

The American elevator acts like the man's patent purge- it worked.

As the inventor said, "This purge doesn't waste any time fooling

around; it attends strictly to business."

That New-Yorkers have the cleanest, quickest, and most admirable

system of street railways in the world has been forced upon you by the

abnormal appreciation you have of your hackman. We ought always to

be grateful to him for that service. Nobody else would have brought

such a system into existence for us. We ought to build him a monument.

We owe him one as much as we owe one to anybody. Let it be a tall one.

Nothing permanent, of course; build it of plaster, say. Then gaze at

it and realize how grateful we are- for the time being- and then

pull it down and throw it on the ash-heap. That's the way to honor

your public heroes.

As to our streets, I find them cleaner than they used to be. I

miss those dear old landmarks, the symmetrical mountain ranges of dust

and dirt that used to be piled up along the streets for the wind and

rain to tear down at their pleasure. Yes, New York is cleaner than

Bombay. I realize that I have been in Bombay, that I now am in New

York; that it is not my duty to flatter Bombay, but rather to

flatter New York.

Compared with the wretched attempts of London to light that city,

New York may fairly be said to be a well-lighted city. Why, London's

attempt at good lighting is almost as bad as London's attempt at rapid

transit. There is just one good system of rapid transit in London- the

"Tube," and that, of course, had been put in by Americans. Perhaps,

after a while, those Americans will come back and give New York also a

good underground system. Perhaps they have already begun. I have

been so busy since I came back that I haven't had time as yet to go

down cellar.

But it is by the laws of the city, it is by the manners of the city,

it is by the ideals of the city, it is by the customs of the city

and by the municipal government which all these elements correct,

support, and foster, by which the foreigner judges the city. It is

by these that he realizes that New York may, indeed, hold her head

high among the cities of the world. It is by these standards that he

knows whether to class the city higher or lower than the other

municipalities of the world.

Gentlemen, you have the best municipal government in the world-

the purest and the most fragrant. The very angels envy you, and wish

they could establish a government like it in heaven. You got it by a

noble fidelity to civic duty. You got it by stern and ever-watchful

exertion of the great powers with which you are charged by the

rights which were handed down to you by your forefathers, by your

manly refusal to let base men invade the high places of your

government, and by instant retaliation when any public officer has

insulted you in the city's name by swerving in the slightest from

the upright and full performance of his duty. It is you who have

made this city the envy of the cities of the world. God will bless you

for it- God will bless you for it. Why, when you approach the final

resting-place the angels of heaven will gather at the gates and cry

out:

"Here they come! Show them to the archangel's box, and turn the

lime-light on them!"

CHINA AND THE PHILIPPINES.

AT A DINNER GIVEN IN THE WALDORF-ASTORIA HOTEL,

DECEMBER, 1900.

Winston Spencer Churchill was introduced by Mr. Clemens

FOR years I've been a self-appointed missionary to bring about the

union of America and the motherland. They ought to be united. Behold

America, the refuge of the oppressed from everywhere (who can pay

fifty dollars' admission)- any one except a Chinaman- standing up

for human rights everywhere, even helping China let people in free

when she wants to collect fifty dollars upon them. And how unselfishly

England has wrought for the open door for all! And how piously America

has wrought for that open door in all cases where it was not her own!

Yes, as a missionary I've sung my songs of praise. And yet I think

that England sinned when she got herself into a war in South Africa

which she could have avoided, just as we sinned in getting into a

similar war in the Philippines. Mr. Churchill, by his father, is an

Englishman; by his mother he is an American- no doubt a blend that

makes the perfect man. England and America; yes, we are kin. And now

that we are also kin in sin, there is nothing more to be desired.

The harmony is complete, the blend is perfect.

THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL MORALS.

The New Vagabonds Club of London, made up of the leading younger

literary men of the day, gave a dinner in honor of Mr. and Mrs.

Clemens, July 8, 1899.

IT has always been difficult- leave that word difficult- not

exceedingly difficult, but just difficult, nothing more than that, not

the slightest shade to add to that- just difficult- to respond

properly, in the right phraseology, when compliments are paid to me;

but it is more than difficult when the compliments are paid to a

better than I- my wife.

And while I am not here to testify against myself- I can't be

expected to do so, a prisoner in your own country is not admitted to

do so- as to which member of the family wrote my books, I could say in

general that really I wrote the books myself. My wife puts the facts

in, and they make it respectable. My modesty won't suffer while

compliments are being paid to literature, and through literature to my

family. I can't get enough of them.

I am curiously situated to-night. It so rarely happens that I am

introduced by a humorist; I am generally introduced by a person of

grave walk and carriage. That makes the proper background of gravity

for brightness. I am going to alter to suit, and haply I may say

some humorous things.

When you start with a blaze of sunshine and upburst of humor, when

you begin with that, the proper office of humor is to reflect, to

put you into that pensive mood of deep thought, to make you think of

your sins, if you wish half an hour to fly. Humor makes me reflect now

to-night, it sets the thinking machinery in motion. Always, when I

am thinking, there come suggestions of what I am, and what we all are,

and what we are coming to. A sermon comes from my lips always when I

listen to a humorous speech.

I seize the opportunity to throw away frivolities, to say

something to plant the seed, and make all better than when I came.

In Mr. Grossmith's remarks there was a subtle something suggesting

my favorite theory of the difference between theoretical morals and

practical morals. I try to instil practical morals in the place of

theatrical- I mean theoretical; but as an addendum- an annex-

something added to theoretical morals.

When your chairman said it was the first time he had ever taken

the chair, he did not mean that he had not taken lots of other things;

he attended my first lecture and took notes. This indicated the

man's disposition. There was nothing else flying round, so he took

notes; he would have taken anything he could get.

I can bring a moral to bear here which shows the difference

between theoretical morals and practical morals. Theoretical morals

are the sort you get on your mother's knee, in good books, and from

the pulpit. You gather them in your head, and not in your heart;

they are theory without practice. Without the assistance of practice

to perfect them, it is difficult to teach a child to "be honest, don't

steal."

I will teach you how it should be done, lead you into temptation,

teach you how to steal, so that you may recognize when you have stolen

and feel the proper pangs. It is no good going round and bragging

you have never taken the chair.

As by the fires of experience, so by commission of crime, you

learn real morals. Commit all the crimes, familiarize yourself with

all sins, take them in rotation (there are only two or three

thousand of them), stick to it, commit two or three every day, and

by-and-by you will be proof against them. When you are through you

will be proof against all sins and morally perfect. You will be

vaccinated against every possible commission of them. This is the only

way.

I will read you a written statement upon the subject that I wrote

three years ago to read to the Sabbath-schools. [Here the lecturer

turned his pockets out, but without success.] No! I have left it at

home. Still, it was a mere statement of fact, illustrating the value

of practical morals produced by the commission of crime.

It was in my boyhood- just a statement of fact, reading is only more

formal, merely facts, merely pathetic facts, which I can state so as

to be understood. It relates to the first time I ever stole a

watermelon; that is, I think it was the first time; anyway, it was

right along there somewhere.

I stole it out of a farmer's wagon while he was waiting on another

customer. "Stole" is a harsh term. I withdrew- I retired that

watermelon. I carried it to a secluded corner of a lumber-yard. I

broke it open. It was green- the greenest watermelon raised in the

valley that year.

The minute I saw it was green I was sorry, and began to reflect-

reflection is the beginning of reform. If you don't reflect when you

commit a crime then that crime is of no use; it might just as well

have been committed by some one else. You must reflect or the value is

lost; you are not vaccinated against committing it again.

I began to reflect. I said to myself: "What ought a boy to do who

has stolen a green watermelon? What would George Washington do, the

father of his country, the only American who could not tell a lie?

What would he do? There is only one right, high, noble thing for any

boy to do who has stolen a watermelon of that class: he must make

restitution; he must restore that stolen property to its rightful

owner." I said I would do it when I made that good resolution. I

felt it to be a noble, uplifting obligation. I rose up spiritually

stronger and refreshed. I carried that watermelon back- what was

left of it- and restored it to the farmer, and made him give me a ripe

one in its place.

Now you see that this constant impact of crime upon crime protects

you against further commission of crime. It builds you up. A man can't

become morally perfect by stealing one or a thousand green

watermelons, but every little helps.

I was at a great school yesterday (St. Paul's), where for four

hundred years they have been busy with brains, and building up England

by producing Pepys, Miltons, and Marlboroughs. Six hundred boys left

to nothing in the world but theoretical morality. I wanted to become

the professor of practical morality, but the high master was away,

so I suppose I shall have to go on making my living- the same old way-

by adding practical to theoretical morality.

What are the glory that was Greece, the grandeur that was Rome,

compared to the glory and grandeur and majesty of a perfected morality

such as you see before you?

The New Vagabonds are old vagabonds (undergoing the old sort of

reform). You drank my health; I hope I have not been unuseful. Take

this system of morality to your hearts. Take it home to your neighbors

and your graves, and I hope that it will be a long time before you

arrive there.

LAYMAN'S SERMON.

The Young Men's Christian Association asked Mr. Clemens to deliver a

lay sermon at the Majestic Theatre, New York, March 4, 1906. More than

five thousand young men tried to get into the theatre, and in a

short time traffic was practically stopped in the adjacent streets.

The police reserves had to be called out to thin the crowd. Doctor

Fagnani had said something before about the police episode, and Mr.

Clemens took it up.

I HAVE been listening to what was said here, and there is in it a

lesson of citizenship. You created the police, and you are responsible

for them. One must pause, therefore, before criticising them too

harshly. They are citizens, just as we are. A little of citizenship

ought to be taught at the mother's knee and in the nursery.

Citizenship is what makes a republic; monarchies can get along without

it. What keeps a republic on its legs is good citizenship.

Organization is necessary in all things. It is even necessary in

reform. I was an organization myself once- for twelve hours. I was

in Chicago a few years ago about to depart for New York. There were

with me Mr. Osgood, a publisher, and a stenographer. I picked out a

state-room on a train, the principal feature of which was that it

contained the privilege of smoking. The train had started but a

short time when the conductor came in and said that there had been a

mistake made, and asked that we vacate the apartment. I refused, but

when I went out on the platform Osgood and the stenographer agreed

to accept a section. They were too modest.

Now, I am not modest. I was born modest, but it didn't last. I

asserted myself, insisted upon my rights, and finally the Pullman

conductor and the train conductor capitulated, and I was left in

possession.

I went into the dining-car the next morning for breakfast.

Ordinarily I only care for coffee and rolls, but this particular

morning I espied an important-looking man on the other side of the car

eating broiled chicken. I asked for broiled chicken, and I was told by

the waiter and later by the dining-car conductor that there was no

broiled chicken. There must have been an argument, for the Pullman

conductor came in and remarked: "If he wants broiled chicken, give

it to him. If you haven't got it on the train, stop somewhere. It will

be better for all concerned!" I got the chicken.

It is from experiences such as these that you get your education

of life, and you string them into jewels or into tinware, as you may

choose. I have received recently several letters asking my counsel

or advice. The principal request is for some incident that may prove

helpful to the young. There were a lot of incidents in my career to

help me along- sometimes they helped me along faster than I wanted

to go.

Here is such a request. It is a telegram from Joplin, Missouri,

and it reads: "In what one of your works can we find the definition of

a gentleman?"

I have not answered that telegram, either; I couldn't. It seems to

me that if any man has just merciful and kindly instincts he would

be a gentleman, for he would need nothing else in the world.

I received the other day a letter from my old friend, William Dean

Howells- Howells, the head of American literature. No one is able to

stand with him. He is an old, old friend of mine, and he writes me,

"To-morrow I shall be sixty-nine years old." Why, I am surprised at

Howells writing that! I have known him longer than that. I'm sorry

to see a man trying to appear so young. Let's see. Howells says now,

"I see you have been burying Patrick. I suppose he was old, too."

No, he was never old- Patrick. He came to us thirty-six years ago.

He was my coachman on the morning that I drove my young bride to our

new home. He was a young Irishman, slender, tall, lithe, honest,

truthful, and he never changed in all his life. He really was with

us but twenty-five years, for he did not go with us to Europe, but

he never regarded that as separation. As the children grew up he was

their guide. He was all honor, honesty, and affection. He was with

us in New Hampshire, with us last summer, and his hair was just as

black, his eyes were just as blue, his form just as straight, and

his heart just as good as on the day we first met. In all the long

years Patrick never made a mistake. He never needed an order, he never

received a command. He knew. I have been asked for my idea of an ideal

gentleman, and I give it to you- Patrick McAleer.

UNIVERSITY SETTLEMENT SOCIETY.

After the serious addresses were made, Seth Low introduced Mr.

Clemens at the Settlement House, February 2, 1901.

THE older we grow the greater becomes our wonder at how much

ignorance one can contain without bursting one's clothes. Ten days ago

I did not know anything about the University Settlement except what

I'd read in the pamphlets sent me. Now, after being here and hearing

Mrs. Hewitt and Mrs. Thomas, it seems to me I know of nothing like

it at all. It's a charity that carries no humiliation with it.

Marvellous it is, to think of schools where you don't have to drive

the children in but drive them out. It was not so in my day.

Down-stairs just now I saw a dancing lesson going on. You must pay a

cent for a lesson. You can't get it for nothing. That's the reason I

never learned to dance.

But it was the pawnbroker's shop you have here that interested me

mightily. I've known something about pawnbrokers' shops in my time,

but here you have a wonderful plan. The ordinary pawnbroker charges,

thirty-six per cent; a year for a loan, and I've paid more myself, but

here a man or woman in distress can obtain a loan. for one per cent. a

month! It's wonderful!

I've been interested in all I've heard to-day, especially in the

romances recounted by Mrs. Thomas, which reminds me that I have a

romance of my own in my autobiography, which I am building for the

instruction of the world.

In San Francisco, many years ago, when I was a newspaper reporter

(perhaps I should say I had been and was willing to be), a

pawnbroker was taking care of what property I had. There was a

friend of mine, a poet, out of a job, and he was having a hard time of

it, too. There was passage in it, but I guess I've got to keep that

for the autobiography.

Well, my friend the poet thought his life was a failure, and I

told him I thought it was, and then he said he thought he ought to

commit suicide, and I said "all right," which was disinterested advice

to a friend in trouble; but, like all such advice, there was just a

little bit of self-interest back of it, for if I could get a "scoop"

on the other newspapers I could get a job.

The poet could be spared, and so, largely for his own good and

partly for mine, I kept the thing in his mind, which was necessary, as

would-be suicides are very changeable and hard to hold to their

purpose. He had a preference for a pistol, which was an

extravagance, for we hadn't enough between us to hire a pistol. A fork

would have been easier.

And so he concluded to drown himself, and I said it was an excellent

idea- the only trouble being that he was so good a swimmer. So we went

down to the beach. I went along to see that the thing was done

right. Then something most romantic happened. There came in on the sea

something that had been on its way for three years. It rolled in

across the broad Pacific with a message that was full of meaning to

that poor poet and cast itself at his feet. It was a life-preserver!

This was a complication. And then I had an idea- he never had any,

especially when he was going to write poetry; I suggested that we pawn

the life-preserver and get a revolver.

The pawnbroker gave us an old derringer with a bullet as big as a

hickory nut. When he heard that it was only a poet that was going to

kill himself he did not quibble. Well, we succeeded in sending a

bullet right through his head. It was a terrible moment when he placed

that pistol against his forehead and stood for an instant. I said,

"Oh, pull the trigger!" and he did, and cleaned out all the gray

matter in his brains. It carried the poetic faculty away, and now he's

a useful member of society.

Now, therefore, I realize that there's no more beneficent

institution than this penny fund of yours, and I want all the poets to

know this. I did think about writing you a check, but now I think I'll

send you a few copies of what one of your little members called

Strawberry Finn.

PUBLIC EDUCATION ASSOCIATION.

ADDRESS AT A MEETING OF THE BERKELEY LYCEUM,

NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 23, 1900.

I DON'T suppose that I am called here as an expert on education, for

that would show a lack of foresight on your part and a deliberate

intention to remind me of my shortcomings.

As I sat here looking around for an idea it struck me that I was

called for two reasons. One was to do good to me, a poor unfortunate

traveller on the world's wide ocean, by giving me a knowledge of the

nature and scope of your society and letting me know that others

beside myself have been of some use in the world. The other reason

that I can see is that you have called me to show by way of contrast

what education can accomplish if administered in the right sort of

doses.

Your worthy president said that the school pictures, which have

received the admiration of the world at the Paris Exposition, have

been sent to Russia, and this was a compliment from that Government-

which is very surprising to me. Why, it is only an hour since I read a

cablegram in the newspapers beginning "Russia Proposes to Retrench." I

was not expecting such a thunderbolt, and I thought what a happy thing

it will be for Russians when the retrenchment will bring home the

thirty thousand Russian troops now in Manchuria, to live in peaceful

pursuits. I thought this was what Germany should do also without

delay, and that France and all the other nations in China should

follow suit.

Why should not China be free from the foreigners, who are only

making trouble on her soil? If they would only all go home, what a

pleasant place China would be for the Chinese! We do not allow

Chinamen to come here, and I say in all seriousness that it would be a

graceful thing to let China decide who shall go there.

China never wanted foreigners any more than foreigners wanted

Chinamen, and on this question I am with the Boxers every time. The

Boxer is a patriot. He loved his country better than he does the

countries of other people. I wish him success. The Boxer believes in

driving us out of his country. I am a Boxer too, for I believe in

driving him out of our country.

When I read the Russian despatch further my dream of world peace

vanished. It said that the vast expense of maintaining the army had

made it necessary to retrench, and so the Government had decided

that to support the army it would be necessary to withdraw the

appropriation from the public schools. This is a monstrous idea to us.

We believe that out of the public school grows the greatness of a

nation.

It is curious to reflect how history repeats itself the world

over. Why, I remember the same thing was done when I was a boy on

the Mississippi River. There was a proposition in a township there

to discontinue public schools because they were too expensive. An

old farmer spoke up and said if they stopped the schools they would

not save anything, because every time a school was closed a jail had

to be built.

It's like feeding a dog on his own tail. He'll never get fat. I

believe it is better to support schools than jails.

The work of your association is better and shows more wisdom than

the Czar of Russia and all his people. This is not much of a

compliment, but it's the best I've got in stock.

EDUCATION AND CITIZENSHIP.

On the evening of May 14, 1908, the alumni of the College of the

City of New York celebrated the opening of the new college buildings

at a banquet in the Waldorf-Astoria. Mr. Clemens followed Mayor

McClellan.

I AGREED when the Mayor said that there was not a man within hearing

who did not agree that citizenship should be placed above everything

else, even learning.

Have you ever thought about this? Is there a college in the whole

country where there is a chair of good citizenship? There is a kind of

bad citizenship which is taught in the schools, but no real good

citizenship taught. There are some which teach insane citizenship,

bastard citizenship, but that is all. Patriotism! Yes; but

patriotism is usually the refuge of the scoundrel. He is the man who

talks the loudest.

You can begin that chair of citizenship in the College of the City

of New York. You can place it above mathematics and literature, and

that is where it belongs.

We used to trust in God. I think it was in 1863 that some genius

suggested that it be put upon the gold and silver coins which

circulated among the rich. They didn't put it on the nickels and

coppers because they didn't think the poor folks had any trust in God.

Good citizenship would teach accuracy of thinking and accuracy of

statement. Now, that motto on the coin is an overstatement. Those

Congressmen had no right to commit this whole country to a theological

doctrine. But since they did, Congress ought to state what our creed

should be.

There was never a nation in the world that put its whole trust in

God. It is a statement made on insufficient evidence. Leaving out

the gamblers, the burglars, and the plumbers, perhaps we do put our

trust in God after a fashion. But, after all, it is an overstatement.

If the cholera or black plague should come to these shores,

perhaps the bulk of the nation would pray to be delivered from it, but

the rest would put their trust in the Health Board of the City of

New York.

I read in the papers within the last day or two of a poor young girl

who they said was a leper. Did the people in that populous section

of the country where she was- did they put their trust in God? The

girl was afflicted with the leprosy, a disease which cannot be

communicated from one person to another.

Yet, instead of putting their trust in God, they harried that poor

creature, shelterless and friendless, from place to place, exactly

as they did in the Middle Ages, when they made lepers wear bells, so

that people could be warned of their approach and avoid them.

Perhaps those people in the Middle Ages thought they were putting

their trust in God.

The President ordered the removal of that motto from the coin, and I

thought that it was well. I thought that overstatement should not stay

there. But I think it would better read, "Within certain judicious

limitations we trust in God," and if there isn't enough room on the

coin for this, why, enlarge the coin.

Now I want to tell a story about jumping at conclusions. It was told

to me by Bram Stoker, and it concerns a christening. There was a

little clergyman who was prone to jump at conclusions sometimes. One

day he was invited to officiate at a christening. He went. There sat

the relatives- intelligent-looking relatives they were. The little

clergyman's instinct came to him to make a great speech. He was

given to flights of oratory that way- a very dangerous thing, for

often the wings which take one into clouds of oratorical enthusiasm

are wax and melt up there, and down you come.

But the little clergyman couldn't resist. He took the child in his

arms, and, holding it, looked at it a moment. It wasn't much of a

child. It was little, like a sweet-potato. Then the little clergyman

waited impressively, and then: "I see in your countenances," he

said, "disappointment of him. I see you are disappointed with this

baby. Why? Because he is so little. My friends, if you had but the

power of looking into the future you might see that great things may

come of little things. There is the great ocean, holding the navies of

the world, which comes from little drops of water no larger than a

woman's tears. There are the great constellations in the sky, made

up of little bits of stars. Oh, if you could consider his future you

might see that he might become the greatest poet of the universe,

the greatest warrior the world has ever known, greater than Caesar,

than Hannibal, than- er- er" (turning to the father)- "what's his

name?"

The father hesitated, then whispered back: "His name? Well, his name

is Mary Ann."

COURAGE

COURAGE.

At a beefsteak dinner, given by artists, caricaturists, and

humorists of New York City, April 18, 1908, Mr. Clemens, Mr. H. H.

Rogers, and Mr. Patrick McCarren were the guests of honor. Each wore a

white apron, and each made a short speech.

IN the matter of courage we all have our limits. There never was a

hero who did not have his bounds. I suppose it may be said of Nelson

and all the others whose courage has been advertised that there came

times in their lives when their bravery knew it had come to its limit.

I have found mine a good many times. Sometimes this was expected-

often it was unexpected. I know a man who is not afraid to sleep

with a rattlesnake, but you could not get him to sleep with a

safety-razor.

I never had the courage to talk across a long, narrow room I

should be at the end of the room facing all the audience. If I attempt

to talk across a room I find myself turning this way and that, and

thus at alternate periods I have part of the audience behind me. You

ought never to have any part of the audience behind you; you never can

tell what they are going to do.

I'll sit down.

THE DINNER TO MR. CHOATE.

AT A DINNER GIVEN IN HONOR OF AMBASSADOR

JOSEPH H. CHOATE AT THE LOTOS CLUB,

NOVEMBER 24, 1901.

The speakers, among others, were: Senator Depew, William Henry White,

Speaker Thomas Reed, and Mr. Choate. Mr. Clemens spoke, in part, as

follows:

THE greatness of this country rests on two anecdotes. The first

one is that of Washington and his hatchet, representing the foundation

of true speaking, which is the characteristic of our people. The

second one is an old one, and I've been waiting to hear it to-night,

but as nobody has told it yet, I will tell it.

You've heard it before, and you'll hear it many, many times more. It

is an anecdote of our guest, of the time when he was engaged as a

young man with a gentle Hebrew, in the process of skinning the client.

The main part in that business is the collection of the bill for

services in skinning the man. "Services" is the term used in that

craft for the operation of that kind- diplomatic in its nature.

Choate's- co-respondent- made out a bill for $500 for his

services, so called. But Choate told him he had better leave the

matter to him, and the next day he collected the bill for the services

and handed the Hebrew $5000, saying, "That's your half of the loot,"

and inducing that memorable response: "Almost thou persuadest me to be

a Christian.'

The deep-thinkers didn't merely laugh when that happened. They

stopped to think, and said: "There's a rising man. He must be

rescued from the law and consecrated to diplomacy. The commercial

advantages of a great nation lie there in that man's keeping. We no

longer require a man to take care of our moral character before the

world. Washington and his anecdote have done that. We require a man to

take care of our commercial prosperity."

Mr. Choate has carried that trait with him, and, as Mr. Carnegie has

said, he has worked like a mole underground.

We see the result when American railroad iron is sold so cheap in

England that the poorest family can have it. He has so beguiled that

Cabinet of England.

He has been spreading the commerce of this nation, and has depressed

English commerce in the same ratio. This was the principle

underlying that anecdote, and the wise men saw it; the principle of

give and take- give one and take ten- the principle of diplomacy.

ON STANLEY AND LIVINGSTONE.

Mr. Clemens was entertained at dinner by the White-friars' Club,

London, at the Mitre Tavern, on the evening of August 6, 1872. In

reply to the toast in his honor he said:

GENTLEMEN,- I thank you very heartily indeed for this expression

of kindness toward me. What I have done for England and civilization

in the arduous affairs which I have engaged in (that is good: that

is so smooth that I will say it again and again)- what I have done for

England and civilization in the arduous part I have performed I have

done with a single-hearted devotion and with no hope of reward. I am

proud, I am very proud, that it was reserved for me to find Doctor

Livingstone and for Mr. Stanley to get all the credit. I hunted for

that man in Africa all over seventy-five or one hundred parishes,

thousands and thousands of miles in the wilds and deserts all over the

place, sometimes riding negroes and sometimes travelling by rail. I

didn't mind the rail or anything else, so that I didn't come in for

the tar and feathers. I found that man at Ujiji- a place you may

remember if you have ever been there- and it was a very great

satisfaction that I found him just in the nick of time. I found that

poor old man deserted by his niggers and by his geographers,

deserted by all of his kind except the gorillas- dejected,

miserable, famishing, absolutely famishing- but he was eloquent.

Just as I found him he had eaten his last elephant, and he said to me:

"God knows where I shall get another." He had nothing to wear except

his venerable and honorable naval suit, and nothing to eat but his

diary.

But I said to him: "It is all right; I have discovered you, and

Stanley will be here by the four-o'clock train and will discover you

officially, and then we will turn to and have a reg'lar good time."

I said: "Cheer up, for Stanley has got corn, ammunition, glass

beads, hymn-books, whiskey, and everything which the human heart can

desire; he has got all kinds of valuables, including telegraph-poles

and a few cart-loads of money. By this time communication has been

made with the land of Bibles and civilization, and property will

advance." And then we surveyed all that country, from Ujiji, through

Unanogo and other places, to Unyanyembe. I mention these names

simply for your edification, nothing more- do not expect it-

particularly as intelligence to the Royal Geographical Society. And

then, having filled up the old man, we were all too full for utterance

and departed. We have since then feasted on honors.

Stanley has received a snuff-box and I have received considerable

snuff; he has got to write a book and gather in the rest of the

credit, and I am going to levy on the copyright and to collect the

money. Nothing comes amiss to me- cash or credit; but, seriously, I do

feel that Stanley is the chief man and an illustrious one, and I do

applaud him with all my heart. Whether he is an American or a Welshman

by birth, or one, or both, matter's not to me. So far as I am

personally concerned, I am simply here to stay a few months, and to

see English people and to learn English manners and customs, and to

enjoy myself; so the simplest thing I can do is to thank you for the

toast you have honored me with and for the remarks you have made,

and to wish health and prosperity to the White-friar's' Club, and to

sink down to my accustomed level.

HENRY M. STANLEY.

ADDRESS DELIVERED IN BOSTON, NOVEMBER, 1886.

Mr. Clemens introduced Mr. Stanley.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, if any should ask, Why is it that you are here

as introducer of the lecturer? I should answer that I happened to be

around and was asked to perform this function. I was quite willing

to do so, and, as there was no sort of need of an introduction,

anyway, it could be necessary only that some person come forward for a

moment and do an unnecessary thing, and this is quite in my line. Now,

to introduce so illustrious a name as Henry M. Stanley by any detail

of what the man has done is clear aside from my purpose; that would be

stretching the unnecessary to an unconscionable degree. When I

contrast what I have achieved in my measurably brief life with what he

has achieved in his possibly briefer one, the effect is to sweep

utterly away the ten-story edifice of my own self-appreciation and

leave nothing behind but the cellar. When you compare these

achievements of his with the achievements of really great men who

exist in history, the comparison, I believe, is in his favor. I am not

here to disparage Columbus.

No, I won't do that; but when you come to regard the achievements of

these two men, Columbus and Stanley, from the standpoint of the

difficulties their encountered, the advantage is with Stanley and

against Columbus. Now, Columbus started out to discover America. Well,

he didn't need to do anything at all but sit in the cabin of his

ship and hold his grip and sail straight on, and America would

discover itself. Here it was, barring his passage the whole length and

breadth of the South American continent, and he couldn't get by it.

He'd got to discover it. But Stanley started out to find Doctor

Livingstone, who was scattered abroad, as you may say, over the length

and breadth of a vast slab of Africa as big as the United States.

It was a blind kind of search. He was the worst scattered of men.

But I will throw the weight of this introduction upon one very

peculiar feature of Mr. Stanley's character, and that is his

indestructible Americanism- an Americanism which he is proud of. And

in this day and time, when it is the custom to ape and imitate English

methods and fashion, it is like a breath of fresh air to stand in

the presence of this untainted American citizen who has been

caressed and complimented by half of the crowned heads of Europe,

who could clothe his body from his head to his heels with the orders

and decorations lavished upon him. And yet, when the untitled

myriads of his own country put out their hands in welcome to him and

greet him, "Well done," through the Congress of the United States,

that is the crown that is worth all the rest to him. He is a product

of institutions which exist in no other country on earth- institutions

that bring out all that is best and most heroic in a man. I

introduce Henry M. Stanley.

DINNER TO MR. JEROME.

A dinner to express their confidence in the integrity and good

judgment of District-Attorney Jerome was given as Delmonico's by

over three hundred of his admirers on the evening of May 7, 1909.

INDEED, that is very sudden. I was not informed that the verdict was

going to depend upon my judgment, but that makes not the least

difference in the world when you already know all about it. It is

not any matter when you are called upon to express it; you can get

up and do it, and my verdict has already been recorded in my heart and

in my head as regards Mr. Jerome and his administration of the

criminal affairs of this county.

I agree with everything Mr. Choate has said in his letter

regarding Mr. Jerome; I agree with everything Mr. Shepard has said;

and I agree with everything Mr. Jerome has said in his own

commendation. And I thought Mr. Jerome was modest in that. If he had

been talking about another officer of this county, he could have

painted the joys and sorrows of office and his victories in even

stronger language than he did.

I voted for Mr. Jerome in those old days, and I should like to

vote for him again if he runs for any office. I moved out of New York,

and that is the reason, I suppose, I cannot vote for him again.

There may be some way, but I have not found it out. But now I am a

farmer- a farmer up in Connecticut, and winning laurels. Those

people already speak with such high favor, admiration, of my

farming, and they say that I am the only man that has ever come to

that region who could make two blades of grass grow where only three

grew before.

Well, I cannot vote for him. You see that. As it stands now, I

cannot. I am crippled in that way and to that extent, for I would ever

so much like to do it. I am not a Congress, and I cannot distribute

pensions, and I don't know any other legitimate way to buy a vote. But

if I should think of any legitimate way, I shall make use of it, and

then I shall vote for Mr. Jerome.

HENRY IRVING.

The Dramatic and Literary Society of London gave a welcome-home

dinner to Sir Henry Irving at the Savoy Hotel, London, June 9, 1900.

In proposing the toast of "The Drama" Mr. Clemens said:

I FIND my task a very easy one. I have been a dramatist for thirty

years. I have had an ambition in all that time to overdo the work of

the Spaniard who said he left behind him four hundred dramas when he

died. I leave behind me four hundred and fifteen, and am not yet dead.

The greatest of all the arts is to write a drama. It is a most

difficult thing. It requires the highest talent possible and the

rarest gifts. No, there is another talent that ranks with it- for

anybody can write a drama- I had four hundred of them- but to get

one accepted requires real ability. And I have never had that felicity

yet.

But human nature is so constructed, we are so persistent, that

when we know that we are born to a thing we do not care what the world

thinks about it. We go on exploiting that talent year after year, as I

have done. I shall go on writing dramas, and some day the impossible

may happen, but I am not looking for it.

In writing plays the chief thing is novelty. The world grows tired

of solid forms in all the arts. I struck a new idea myself years

ago. I was not surprised at it. I was always expecting it would

happen. A person who has suffered disappointment for many years

loses confidence, and I thought I had better make inquiries before I

exploited my new idea of doing a drama in the form of a dream, so I

wrote to a great authority on knowledge of all kinds, and asked him

whether it was new.

I could depend upon him. He lived in my dear home in America- that

dear home, dearer to me through taxes. He sent me a list of plays in

which that old device had been used, and he said that there was also a

modern lot. He travelled back to China and to a play dated two

thousand six hundred years before the Christian era. He said he

would follow it up with a list of the previous plays of the kind,

and in his innocence would have carried them back to the Flood.

That is the most discouraging thing that has ever happened to me

in my dramatic career. I have done a world of good in a silent and

private way, and have furnished Sir Henry Irving with plays and

plays and plays. What has he achieved through that influence? See

where he stands now- on the summit of his art in two worlds- and it

was I who put him there- that partly put him there.

I need not enlarge upon the influence the drama has exerted upon

civilization. It has made good morals entertaining. I am to be

followed by Mr. Pinero. I conceive that we stand at the head of the

profession. He has not written as many plays as I have, but he has had

that God-given talent, which I lack, of working them off on the

manager. I couple his name with this toast, and add the hope that

his influence will be supported in exercising his masterly

handicraft in that great gift, and that he will long live to

continue his fine work.

DINNER TO HAMILTON W. MABIE.

ADDRESS DELIVERED APRIL 29, 1901.

In introducing Mr. Clemens, Doctor Van Dyke said:

"The longer the speaking goes on to-night the more I wonder how I

got this job, and the only explanation I can give for it is that it is

the same kind of compensation for the number of articles I have sent

to The Outlook, to be rejected by Hamilton W. Mabie. There is one

man here to-night that has a job cut out for him that none of you

would have had- a man whose humor has put a girdle of light around the

globe, and whose sense of humor has been an example for all five

continents. He is going to speak to you. Gentlemen, you know him

best as Mark Twain."

MR. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN,- This man knows now how it feels to be

the chief guest, and if he has enjoyed it he is the first man I have

ever seen in that position that did enjoy it. And I know, by

side-remarks which he made to me before his ordeal came upon him, that

he was feeling as some of the rest of us have felt under the same

circumstances. He was afraid that he would not do himself justice; but

he did- to my surprise. It is a most serious thing to be a chief guest

on an occasion like this, and it is admirable, it is fine. It is a

great compliment to a man that he shall come out of it so gloriously

as Mr. Mabie came out of it to-night- to my surprise. He did it well.

He appears to be editor of The Outlook, and notwithstanding that,

I have every admiration, because when everything is said concerning

The Outlook, after all one must admit that it is frank in its

delinquencies, that it is outspoken in its departures from fact,

that it is vigorous in its mistaken criticisms of men like me. I

have lived in this world a long, long time, and I know you must not

judge a man by the editorials that he puts in his paper. A man is

always better than his printed opinions. A man always reserves to

himself on the inside a purity and an honesty and a justice that are a

credit to him, whereas the things that he prints are just the reverse.

Oh yes, you must not judge a man by what he writes in his paper.

Even in an ordinary secular paper a man must observe some care about

it; he must be better than the principles which he puts in print.

And that is the case with Mr. Mabie. Why, to see what he writes

about me and the missionaries you would think he did not have any

principles. But that is Mr. Mabie in his public capacity. Mr. Mabie in

his private capacity is just as clean a man as I am.

In this very room, a month or two ago, some people admired that

portrait; some admired this, but the great majority fastened on

that, and said, "There is a portrait that is a beautiful piece of

art." When that portrait is a hundred years old it will suggest what

were the manners and customs in our time. Just as they talk about

Mr. Mabie to-night, in that enthusiastic way, pointing out the various

virtues of the man and the grace of his spirit, and all that, so was

that portrait talked about. They were enthusiastic, just as we men

have been over the character and the work of Mr. Mabie. And when

they were through they said that portrait, fine as it is, that work,

beautiful as it is, that piece of humanity on that canvas, gracious

and fine as it is, does not rise to those perfections that exist in

the man himself. Come up, Mr. Alexander. [The reference was to James

W. Alexander, who happened to be sitting beneath the portrait of

himself on the wall.] Now, I should come up and show myself. But he

cannot do it, he cannot do it. He was born that way, he was reared

in that way. Let his modesty be an example, and I wish some of you had

it, too. But that is just what I have been saying- that portrait, fine

as it is, is not as fine as the man it represents, and all the

things that have been said about Mr. Mabie, and certainly they have

been very nobly worded and beautiful, still fall short of the real

Mabie.

INTRODUCING NYE AND RILEY.

James Whitcomb Riley and Edgar Wilson Nye (Bill Nye) were to give

readings in Tremont Temple, Boston, November, 1888. Mr. Clemens was

induced to introduce Messrs. Riley and Nye. His appearance on the

platform was a surprise to the audience, and when they recognized

him there was a tremendous demonstration.

I AM very glad indeed to introduce these young people to you, and at

the same time get acquainted with them myself. I have seen them more

than once for a moment, but have not had the privilege of knowing them

personally as intimately as I wanted to. I saw them first, a great

many years ago, when Mr. Barnum had them, and they were just fresh

from Siam. The ligature was their best hold then, the literature

became their best hold later, when one of them committed an

indiscretion, and they had to cut the old bond to accommodate the

sheriff.

In that old former time this one was Chang, that one was Eng. The

sympathy existing between the two was most extraordinary; it was so

fine, so strong, so subtle, that what the one ate the other

digested; when one slept, the other snored; if one sold a thing, the

other scooped the usufruct. This independent and yet dependent

action was observable in all the details of their daily life- I mean

this quaint and arbitrary distribution of originating cause and

resulting effect between the two- between, I may say, this dynamo

and the other always motor, or, in other words, that the one was

always the creating force, the other always the utilizing force; no,

no, for while it is true that within certain well-defined zones of

activity the one was always dynamo and the other always motor,

within certain other well-defined zones these positions became exactly

reversed.

For instance, in moral matters Mr. Chang Riley was always dynamo,

Mr. Eng Nye was always motor; for while Mr. Chang Riley had a high- in

fact, an abnormally high and fine- moral sense, he had no machinery to

work it with; whereas, Mr. Eng Nye, who hadn't any moral sense at all,

and hasn't yet, was equipped with all the necessary plant for

putting a noble deed through, if he could only get the inspiration

on reasonable terms outside.

In intellectual matters, on the other hand, Mr. Eng Nye was always

dynamo, Mr. Chang Riley was always motor; Mr. Eng Nye had a stately

intellect, but couldn't make it go; Mr. Chang Riley hadn't, but could.

That is to say, that while Mr. Chang Riley couldn't think things

himself, he had a marvellous natural grace in setting them down and

weaving them together when his pal furnished the raw material.

Thus, working together, they made a strong team; laboring

together, they could do miracles; but break the circuit, and both were

impotent. It has remained so to this day: they must travel together,

hoe, and plant, and plough, and reap, and sell their public

together, or there's no result.

I have made this explanation, this analysis, this vivisection, so to

speak, in order that you may enjoy these delightful adventurers

understandingly. When Mr. Eng Nye's deep and broad and limpid

philosophies flow by in front of you, refreshing all the regions round

about with their gracious floods, you will remember that it isn't

his water; it's the other man's, and he is only working the pump.

And when Mr. Chang Riley enchants your ear, and soothes your spirit,

and touches your heart with the sweet and genuine music of his poetry-

as sweet and as genuine as any that his friends, the birds and the

bees, make about his other friends, the woods and the flowers- you

will remember, while placing justice where justice is due, that it

isn't his music, but the other man's- he is only turning the crank.

I beseech for these visitors a fair field, a single-minded, one-eyed

umpire, and a score bulletin barren of goose-eggs if they earn it- and

I judge they will and hope they will. Mr. James Whitcomb Chang Riley

will now go to the bat.

DINNER TO WHITELAW REID.

ADDRESS AT THE DINNER IN HONOR OF AMBASSADOR REID,

GIVEN BY THE PILGRIMS' CLUB OF NEW YORK

ON FEBRUARY 19, 1908.

I AM very proud to respond to this toast, as it recalls the proudest

day of my life. The delightful hospitality shown me at the time of

my visit to Oxford I shall cherish until I die. In that long and

distinguished career of mine I value that degree above all other

honors. When the ship landed even the stevedores gathered on the shore

and gave an English cheer. Nothing could surpass in my life the

pleasure of those four weeks. No one could pass by me without taking

my hand, even the policemen. I've been in all the principal capitals

of Christendom in my life, and have always been an object of

interest to policemen. Sometimes there was suspicion in their eyes,

but not always. With their puissant hand they would hold up the

commerce of the world to let me pass.

I noticed in the papers this afternoon a despatch from Washington,

saying that Congress would immediately pass a bill restoring to our

gold coinage the motto "In God We Trust." I'm glad of that; I'm glad

of that. I was troubled when that motto was removed. Sure enough,

the prosperities of the whole nation went down in a heap when we

ceased to trust in God in that conspicuously advertised way. I knew

there would be trouble. And if Pierpont Morgan hadn't stepped in-

Bishop Lawrence may now add to his message to the old country that

we are now trusting in God again. So we can discharge Mr. Morgan

from his office with honor.

Mr. Reid said an hour or so ago something about my ruining my

activities last summer. They are not ruined, they are renewed. I am

stronger now- much stronger. I suppose that the spiritual uplift I

received increased my physical power more than anything I ever had

before. I was dancing last night at 12.30 o'clock.

Mr. Choate has mentioned Mr. Reid's predecessors. Mr. Choate's

head is full of history, and some of it is true, too. I enjoyed

hearing him tell about the list of the men who had the place before he

did. He mentioned a long list of those predecessors, people I never

heard of before, and elected five of them to the Presidency by his own

vote. I'm glad and proud to find Mr. Reid in that high position,

because he didn't look it when I knew him forty years ago. I was

talking to Reid the other day, and he showed me my autograph on an old

paper twenty years old. I didn't know I had an autograph twenty

years ago. Nobody ever asked me for it.

I remember a dinner I had long ago with Whitelaw Reid and John Hay

at Reid's expense. I had another last summer when I was in London at

the embassy that Choate blackguards so. I'd like to live there.

Some people say they couldn't live on the salary, but I could live

on the salary and the nation together. Some of us don't appreciate

what this country can do. There's John Hay, Reid, Choate, and me. This

is the only country in the world where youth, talent, and energy can

reach such heights. It shows what we could do without means, and

what people can do with talent and energy when they find it in

people like us.

When I first came to New York they were all struggling young men,

and I am glad to see that they have got on in the world. I knew John

Hay when I had no white hairs in my head and more hair than Reid has

now. Those were days of joy and hope. Reid and Hay were on the staff

of the Tribune. I went there once in that old building, and I looked

all around, and I finally found a door ajar and looked in. It wasn't

Reid or Hay there, but it was Horace Greeley. Those were in the days

when Horace Greeley was a king. That was the first time I ever saw him

and the last.

I was admiring him when he stopped and seemed to realize that

there was a fine presence there somewhere. He tried to smile, but he

was out of smiles. He looked at me a moment, and said:

"What in H- do you want?"

He began with that word "H." That's a long word and a profane

word. I don't remember what the word was now, but I recognized the

power of it. I had never used that language myself, but at that moment

I was converted. It has been a great refuge for me in time of trouble.

If a man doesn't know that language he can't express himself on

strenuous occasions. When you have that word at your command let

trouble come.

But later Hay rose, and you know what summit Whitelaw Reid has

reached, and you see me. Those two men have regulated troubles of

nations and conferred peace upon mankind. And in my humble way, of

which I am quite vain, I was the principal moral force in all those

great international movements. These great men illustrated what I say.

Look at us great people- we all come from the dregs of society. That's

what can be done in this country. That's what this country does for

you.

Choate here- he hasn't got anything to say, but he says it just

the same, and he can do it so felicitously, too. I said long ago he

was the handsomest man America ever produced. May the progress of

civilization always rest on such distinguished men as it has in the

past!

ROGERS AND RAILROADS.

AT A BANQUET GIVEN MR. H. H. ROGERS BY THE BUSINESS

MEN OF NORFOLK, VA., CELEBRATING THE OPENING

OF THE VIRGINIAN RAILWAY, APRIL, 3, 1909.

Toastmaster:

"I have often thought that when the time comes, which must come to

all of us, when we reach that Great Way in the Great Beyond, and the

question is propounded, 'What have you done to gain admission into

this great realm?' if the answer could be sincerely made, 'I have made

men laugh,' it would be the surest passport to a welcome entrance.

We have here to-night one who has made millions laugh- not the loud

laughter that bespeaks the vacant mind, but the laugh of intelligent

mirth that helps the human heart and the human mind. I refer, of

course, to Doctor Clemens. I was going to say Mark Twain, his literary

title, which is a household phrase in more homes than that of any

other man, and you know him best by that dear old title."

I THANK you, Mr. Toastmaster, for the compliment which you have paid

me, and I am sure I would rather have made people laugh than cry,

yet in my time I have made some of them cry; and before I stop

entirely I hope to make some more of them cry. I like compliments. I

deal in them myself. I have listened with the greatest pleasure to the

compliments which the chairman has paid to Mr. Rogers and that road of

his to-night, and I hope some of them are deserved.

It is no small distinction to a man like that to sit here before

an intelligent crowd like this and to be classed with Napoleon and

Caesar. Why didn't he say that this was the proudest day of his

life? Napoleon and Caesar are dead, and they can't be here to defend

themselves. But I'm here!

The chairman said, and very truly, that the most lasting thing in

the hands of man are the roads which Caesar built, and it is true that

he built a lot of them; and they are there yet.

Yes, Caesar built a lot of roads in England, and you can find

them. But Rogers has only built one road, and he hasn't finished

that yet. I like to hear my old friend complimented, but I don't

like to hear it overdone.

I didn't go around to-day with the others to see what he is doing. I

will do that in a quiet time, when there is not anything going on, and

when I shall not be called upon to deliver intemperate compliments

on a railroad in which I own no stock.

They proposed that I go along with the committee and help inspect

that dump down yonder. I didn't go. I saw that dump. I saw that

thing when I was coming in on the steamer, and I didn't go because I

was diffident, sentimentally diffident, about going and looking at

that thing again- that great, long, bony thing; it looked just like

Mr. Rogers's foot.

The chairman says Mr. Rogers is full of practical wisdom, and he is.

It is intimated here that he is a very ingenious man, and he is a very

competent financier. Maybe he is now, but it was not always so. I know

lots of private things in his life which people don't know, and I know

how he started; and it was not a very good start. I could have done

better myself. The first time he crossed the Atlantic he had just made

the first little strike in oil, and he was so young he did not like to

ask questions. He did not like to appear ignorant. To this day he

don't like to appear ignorant, but he can look as ignorant as anybody.

On board the ship they were betting on the run of the ship, betting

a couple of shillings, or half a crown, and they proposed that this

youth from the oil regions should bet on the run of the ship. He did

not like to ask what a half-crown was, and he didn't know; but

rather than be ashamed of himself he did bet half a crown on the run

of the ship, and in bed he could not sleep. He wondered if he could

afford that outlay in case he lost. He kept wondering over it, and

said to himself: "A king's crown must be worth $20,000, so half a

crown would cost $10,000." He could not afford to bet away $10,000

on the run of the ship, so he went up to the stakeholder and gave

him $150 to let him off.

I like to hear Mr. Rogers complimented. I am not stingy in

compliments to him myself. Why, I did it to-day when I sent his wife a

telegram to comfort her. That is the kind of person I am. I knew she

would be uneasy about him. I knew she would be solicitous about what

he might do down here, so I did it to quiet her and to comfort her.

I said he was doing well for a person out of practice. There is

nothing like it. He is like I used to be. There were times when I

was careless- careless in my dress when I got older. You know how

uncomfortable your wife can get when you are going away without her

superintendence. Once when my wife could not go with me (she always

went with me when she could- I always did meet that kind of luck), I

was going to Washington once, a long time ago, in Mr. Cleveland's

first administration, and she could not go; but, in her anxiety that I

should not desecrate the house, she made preparation. She knew that

there was to be a reception of those authors at the White House at

seven o'clock in the evening. She said, "If I should tell you now what

I want to ask of you, you would forget it before you get to

Washington, and, therefore, I have written it on a card, and you

will find it in your dress-vest pocket when you are dressing at the

Arlington- when you are dressing to see the President." I never

thought of it again until I was dressing, and I felt in that pocket

and took it out, and it said, in a kind of imploring way, "Don't

wear your arctics in the White House."

You complimented Mr. Rogers on his energy, his foresightedness,

complimented him in various ways, and he has deserved those

compliments, although I say it myself; and I enjoy them all. There

is one side of Mr. Rogers that has not been mentioned. If you will

leave that to me I will touch upon that. There was a note in an

editorial in one of the Norfolk papers this morning that touched

upon that very thing, that hidden side of Mr. Rogers, where it spoke

of Helen Keller and her affection for Mr. Rogers, to whom she

dedicated her life book. And she has a right to feel that way,

because, without the public knowing anything about it, he rescued,

if I may use that term, that marvellous girl, that wonderful

Southern girl, that girl who was stone deaf, blind, and dumb from

scarlet-fever when she was a baby eighteen months old; and who now

is as well and thoroughly educated as any woman on this planet at

twenty-nine years of age. She is the most marvellous person of her sex

that has existed on this earth since Joan of Arc.

That is not all Mr. Rogers has done; but you never see that side

of his character, because it is never protruding; but he lends a

helping hand daily out of that generous heart of his. You never hear

of it. He is supposed to be a moon which has one side dark and the

other bright. But the other side, though you don't see it, is not

dark; it is bright, and its rays penetrate, and others do see it who

are not God.

I would take this opportunity to tell something that I have never

been allowed to tell by Mr. Rogers, either by my mouth or in print,

and if I don't look at him I can tell it now.

In 1893, when the publishing company of Charles L. Webster, of which

I was financial agent, failed, it left me heavily in debt. If you will

remember what commerce was at that time you will recall that you could

not sell anything, and could not buy anything, and I was on my back;

my books were not worth anything at all, and I could not give away

my copyrights. Mr. Rogers had long enough vision ahead to say, "Your

books have supported you before, and after the panic is over they will

support you again," and that was a correct proposition. He saved my

copyrights, and saved me from financial ruin. He it was who arranged

with my creditors to allow me to roam the face of the earth for four

years and persecute the nations thereof with lectures, promising

that at the end of four years I would pay dollar for dollar. That

arrangement was made; otherwise I would now be living out-of-doors

under an umbrella, and a borrowed one at that.

You see his white mustache and his head trying to get white (he is

always trying to look like me- I don't blame him for that). These

are only emblematic of his character, and that is all. I say,

without exception, hair and all, he is the whitest man I have ever

known.

THE OLD-FASHIONED PRINTER.

ADDRESS AT THE TYPOTHETAE DINNER GIVEN AT DELMONICO'S,

JANUARY 18, 1886, COMMEMORATING THE BIRTHDAY

OF BENJAMIN FRANKLIN.

Mr. Clemens responded to the toast "The Compositor."

THE chairman's historical reminiscences of Gutenberg have caused

me to fall into reminiscences, for I myself am something of an

antiquity. All things change in the procession of years, and it may be

that I am among strangers. It may be that the printer of to-day is not

the printer of thirty-five years ago. I was no stranger to him. I knew

him well. I built his fire for him in the winter mornings; I brought

his water from the village pump; I swept out his office; I picked up

his type from under his stand; and, if he were there to see, I put the

good type in his case and the broken ones among the "hell matter"; and

if he wasn't there to see, I dumped it all with the "pi" on the

imposing-stone- for that was the furtive fashion of the cub, and I was

a cub. I wetted down the paper Saturdays, I turned it Sundays- for

this was a country weekly; I rolled, I washed the rollers, I washed

the forms, I folded the papers, I carried them around at dawn Thursday

mornings. The carrier was then an object of interest to all the dogs

in town. If I had saved up all the bites I ever received, I could keep

M. Pasteur busy for a year. I enveloped the papers that were for the

mail- we had a hundred town subscribers and three hundred and fifty

country ones; the town subscribers paid in groceries and the country

ones in cabbages and cord-wood- when they paid at all, which was

merely sometimes, and then we always stated the fact in the paper, and

gave them a puff; and if we forgot it they stopped the paper. Every

man on the town list helped edit the thing- that is, he gave orders as

to how it was to be edited; dictated its opinions, marked out its

course for it, and every time the boss failed to connect he stopped

his paper. We were just infested with critics, and we tried to satisfy

them all over. We had one subscriber who paid cash, and he was more

trouble than all the rest. He bought us once a year, body and soul,

for two dollars. He used to modify our politics every which way, and

he made us change our religion four times in five years. If we ever

tried to reason with him, he would threaten to stop his paper, and, of

course, that meant bankruptcy and destruction. That man used to

write articles a column and a half long, leaded long primer, and

sign them "Junius," or "Veritas," or "Vox Populi," or some other

high-sounding rot; and then, after it was set up, he would come in and

say he had changed his mind- which was a gilded figure of speech,

because he hadn't any- and order it to be left out. We couldn't afford

"bogus" in that office, so we always took the leads out, altered the

signature, credited the article to the rival paper in the next

village, and put it in. Well, we did have one or two kinds of "bogus."

Whenever there was a barbecue, or a circus, or a baptizing, we knocked

off for half a day, and then to make up for short matter we would

"turn over ads"- turn over the whole page and duplicate it. The

other "bogus" was deep philosophical stuff, which we judged nobody

ever read; so we kept a galley of it standing, and kept on slapping

the same old batches of it in, every now and then, till it got

dangerous. Also, in the early days of the telegraph we used to

economize on the news. We picked out the items that were pointless and

barren of information and stood them on a galley, and changed the

dates and localities, and used them over and over again till the

public interest in them was worn to the bone. We marked the ads, but

we seldom paid any attention to the marks afterward; so the life of

a "td" ad and a "tf" ad was equally eternal. I have seen a "td" notice

of a sheriffs sale still booming serenely along two years after the

sale was over, the sheriff dead, and the whole circumstance become

ancient history. Most of the yearly ads were patent-medicine

stereotypes, and we used to fence with them.

I can see that printing-office of prehistoric times yet, with its

horse bills on the walls, its "d" boxes clogged with tallow, because

we always stood the candle in the "k" box nights, its towel, which was

not considered soiled until it could stand alone, and other signs

and symbols that marked the establishment of that kind in the

Mississippi Valley; and I can see, also, the tramping "jour," who

flitted by in the summer and tarried a day, with his wallet stuffed

with one shirt and a hatful of handbills; for if he couldn't get any

type to set he would do a temperance lecture. His way of life was

simple, his needs not complex; all he wanted was plate and bed and

money enough to get drunk on, and he was satisfied. But it may be,

as I have said, that I am among strangers, and sing the glories of a

forgotten age to unfamiliar ears, so I will "make even" and stop.

SOCIETY OF AMERICAN AUTHORS.

On November 15, 1900, the society gave a reception to Mr. Clemens,

who came with his wife and daughter. So many members surrounded the

guests that Mr. Clemens asked: "Is this genuine popularity or is it

all a part of a prearranged programme?"

CHAIRMAN, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,- It seems a most difficult thing for

any man to say anything about me that is not complimentary. I don't

know what the charm is about me which makes it impossible for a person

to say a harsh thing about me and say it heartily, as if he was glad

to say it.

If this thing keeps on it will make me believe that I am what

these kind chairmen say of me. In introducing me, Judge Ransom spoke

of my modesty as if he was envious of me. I would like to have one man

come out flat-footed and say something harsh and disparaging of me,

even if it were true. I thought at one time, as the learned judge

was speaking, that I had found that man; but he wound up, like all the

others, by saying complimentary things.

I am constructed like everybody else, and enjoy a compliment as well

as any other fool, but I do like to have the other side presented. And

there is another side. I have a wicked side. Estimable friends who

know all about it would tell you and take a certain delight in telling

you things that I have done, and things further that I have not

repented.

The real life that I live, and the real life that I suppose all of

you live, is a life of interior sin. That is what makes life

valuable and pleasant. To lead a life of undiscovered sin! That is

true joy.

Judge Ransom seems to have all the virtues that he ascribes to me.

But, oh my! if you could throw an X-ray through him. We are a pair.

I have made a life-study of trying to appear to be what he seems to

think I am. Everybody believes that I am a monument of all the

virtues, but it is nothing of the sort. I am living two lives, and

it keeps me pretty busy.

Some day there will be a chairman who will forget some of these

merits of mine, and then he will make a speech.

I have more personal vanity than modesty, and twice as much veracity

as the two put together.

When that fearless and forgetful chairman is found there will be

another story told. At the Press Club recently I thought that I had

found him. He started in in the way that I knew I should be painted

with all sincerity, and was leading to things that would not be to

my credit; but when he said that he never read a book of mine I knew

at once that he was a liar, because he never could have had all the

wit and intelligence with which he was blessed unless he had read my

works as a basis.

I like compliments. I like to go home and tell them all over again

to the members of my family. They don't believe them, but I like to

tell them in the home circle, all the same. I like to dream of them if

I can.

I thank everybody for their compliments, but I don't think that I am

praised any more than I am entitled to be.

READING-ROOM OPENING.

On October 13, 1900. Mr. Clemens made his last address preceding his

departure for America at Kensal Rise, London.

I FORMALLY declare this reading-room open, and I think that the

legislature should not compel a community to provide itself with

intelligent food, but give it the privilege of providing it if the

community so desires.

If the community is anxious to have a reading-room it would put

its hand in its pocket and bring out the penny tax. I think it a proof

of the healthy, moral, financial, and mental condition of the

community if it taxes itself for its mental food.

A reading-room is the proper introduction to a library, leading up

through the newspapers and magazines to other literature. What would

we do without newspapers?

Look at the rapid manner in which the news of the Galveston disaster

was made known to the entire world. This reminds me of an episode

which occurred fifteen years ago when I was at church in Hartford,

Connecticut.

The clergyman decided to make a collection for the survivors, if

any. He did not include me among the leading citizens who took the

plates around for collection. I complained to the governor of his lack

of financial trust in me, and he replied: "I would trust you myself-

if you had a bell-punch."

You have paid me many compliments, and I like to listen to

compliments. I indorse all your chairman has said to you about the

union of England and America. He also alluded to my name, of which I

am rather fond.

A little girl wrote me from New Zealand in a letter I received

yesterday, stating that her father said my proper name was not Mark

Twain but Samuel Clemens, but that she knew better, because Clemens

was the name of the man who sold the patent medicine, and his name was

not Mark. She was sure it was Mark Twain, because Mark is in the Bible

and Twain is in the Bible.

I was very glad to get that expression of confidence in my origin,

and as I now know my name to be a scriptural one, I am not without

hopes of making it worthy.

LITERATURE

LITERATURE.

ADDRESS AT THE ROYAL LITERARY FUND BANQUET,

LONDON, MAY 4, 1900.

Anthony Hope introduced Mr. Clemens to make the response to the

toast "Literature."

MR. HOPE has been able to deal adequately with this toast without

assistance from me. Still, I was born generous. If he had advanced any

theories that needed refutation or correction I would have attended to

them, and if he had made any statements stronger than those which he

is in the habit of making I would have dealt with them.

In fact, I was surprised at the mildness of his statements. I

could not have made such statements if I had preferred to, because

to exaggerate is the only way I can approximate to the truth. You

cannot have a theory without principles. Principles is another name

for prejudices. I have no prejudices in politics, religion,

literature, or anything else.

I am now on my way to my own country to run for the presidency

because there are not yet enough candidates in the field, and those

who have entered are too much hampered by their own principles,

which are prejudices.

I propose to go there to purify the political atmosphere. I am in

favor of everything everybody is in favor of. What you should do is to

satisfy the whole nation, not half of it, for then you would only be

half a President.

There could not be a broader platform than mine. I am in favor of

anything and everything- of temperance and intemperance, morality

and qualified immorality, gold standard and free silver.

I have tried all sorts of things, and that is why I want to try

the great position of ruler of a country. I have been in turn

reporter, editor, publisher, author, lawyer, burglar. I have worked my

way up, and wish to continue to do so.

I read to-day in a magazine article that Christendom issued last

year fifty-five thousand new books. Consider what that means!

Fifty-five thousand new books meant fifty-four thousand new authors.

We are going to have them all on our hands to take care of sooner or

later. Therefore, double your subscriptions to the literary fund!

DISAPPEARANCE OF LITERATURE.

ADDRESS AT THE DINNER OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY CLUB,

AT SHERRY'S, NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 20, 1900.

Mr. Clemens spoke to the toast "The Disappearance of Literature."

Doctor Gould presided, and in introducing Mr. Clemens said that he

(the speaker), when in Germany, had to do a lot of apologizing for a

certain literary man who was taking what the Germans thought undue

liberties with their language.

IT wasn't necessary for your chairman to apologize for me in

Germany. It wasn't necessary at all. Instead of that he ought to

have impressed upon those poor benighted Teutons the service I

rendered them. Their language had needed untangling for a good many

years. Nobody else seemed to want to take the job, and so I took it,

and I flatter myself that I made a pretty good job of it. The

Germans have an inhuman way of cutting up their verbs. Now a verb

has a hard time enough of it in this world when it's all together.

It's downright inhuman to split it up. But that's just what those

Germans do. They take part of a verb and put it down here, like a

stake, and they take the other part of it and put it away over

yonder like another stake, and between these two limits they just

shovel in German. I maintain that there is no necessity for

apologizing for a man who helped in a small way to stop such

mutilation.

We have heard a discussion to-night on the disappearance of

literature. That's no new thing. That's what certain kinds of

literature have been doing for several years. The fact is, my friends,

that the fashion in literature changes, and the literary tailors

have to change their cuts or go out of business. Professor

Winchester here, if I remember fairly correctly what he said, remarked

that few, if any, of the novels produced to-day would live as long

as the novels of Walter Scott. That may be his notion. Maybe he is

right; but so far as I am concerned, I don't care if they don't.

Professor Winchester also said something about there being no modern

epics like Paradise Lost. I guess he's right. He talked as if he was

pretty familiar with that piece of literary work, and nobody would

suppose that he never had read it. I don't believe any of you have

ever read Paradise Lost, and you don't want to. That's something

that you just want to take on trust. It's a classic, just as Professor

Winchester says, and it meets his definition of a classic- something

that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read.

Professor Trent also had a good deal to say about the

disappearance of literature. He said that Scott would outlive all

his critics. I guess that's true. The fact of the business is,

you've got to be one of two ages to appreciate Scott. When you're

eighteen you can read Ivanhoe, and you want to wait until you are

ninety to read some of the rest. It takes a pretty well-regulated,

abstemious critic to live ninety years.

But as much as these two gentlemen have talked about the

disappearance of literature, they didn't say anything about my

books. Maybe they think they've disappeared. If they do, that just

shows their ignorance on the general subject of literature. I am not

as young as I was several years ago, and maybe I'm not so fashionable,

but I'd be willing to take my chances with Mr. Scott to-morrow morning

in selling a piece of literature to the Century Publishing Company.

And I haven't got much of a pull here, either. I often think that

the highest compliment ever paid to my poor efforts was paid by Darwin

through President Eliot, of Harvard College. At least, Eliot said it

was a compliment, and I always take the opinion of great men like

college presidents on all such subjects as that.

I went out to Cambridge one day a few years ago and called on

President Eliot. In the course of the conversation he said that he had

just returned from England, and that he was very much touched by

what he considered the high compliment Darwin was paying to my

books, and he went on to tell me something like this:

"Do you know that there is one room in Darwin's house, his

bedroom, where the housemaid is never allowed to touch two things? One

is a plant he is growing and studying while it grows" (it was one of

those insect-devouring plants which consumed bugs and beetles and

things for the particular delectation of Mr. Darwin) "and the other

some books that lie on the night table at the head of his bed. They

are your books, Mr. Clemens, and Mr. Darwin reads them every night

to lull him to sleep."

My friends, I thoroughly appreciated that compliment, and considered

it the highest one that was ever paid to me. To be the means of

soothing to sleep a brain teeming with bugs and squirming things

like Darwin's was something that I had never hoped for, and now that

he is dead I never hope to be able to do it again.

THE NEW YORK PRESS CLUB DINNER.

AT THE ANNUAL DINNER, NOVEMBER 13, 1900.

Col. William L. Brown, the former editor of the Daily News, as

president of the club, introduced Mr. Clemens as the principal

ornament of American literature.

I MUST say that I have already begun to regret that I left my gun at

home. I've said so many times when a chairman has distressed me with

just such compliments that the next time such a thing occurs I will

certainly use a gun on that chairman. It is my privilege to compliment

him in return. You behold before you a very, very old man. A cursory

glance at him would deceive the most penetrating. His features seem to

reveal a person dead to all honorable instincts- they seem to bear the

traces of all the known crimes, instead of the marks of a life spent

for the most part, and now altogether, in the Sunday-school- of a life

that may well stand as an example to all generations that have risen

or will riz- I mean to say, will rise. His private character is

altogether suggestive of virtues which to all appearances he has

not. If you examine his past history you will find it as deceptive

as his features, because it is marked all over with waywardness and

misdemeanor- mere effects of a great spirit upon a weak body- mere

accidents of a great career. In his heart he cherishes every virtue on

the list of virtues, and he practises them all- secretly- always

secretly. You all know him so well that there is no need for him to be

introduced here. Gentlemen, Colonel Brown.

THE ALPHABET AND SIMPLIFIED SPELLING.

ADDRESS AT THE DINNER GIVEN TO MR. CARNEGIE AT THE

DEDICATION OF THE NEW YORK ENGINEERS' CLUB,

DECEMBER 9, 1907.

Mr. Clemens was introduced by the president of the club, who,

quoting from the Mark Twain autobiography, recalled the day when the

distinguished writer came to New York with $3 in small change in his

pockets and a $10 bill sewed in his clothes.

IT seems to me that I was around here in the neighborhood of the

Public Library about fifty or sixty years ago. I don't deny the

circumstance, although I don't see how you got it out of my

autobiography, which was not to be printed until I am dead, unless I'm

dead now. I had that $3 in change, and I remember well the $10 which

was sewed in my coat. I have prospered since. Now I have plenty of

money and a disposition to squander it, but I can't. One of those

trust companies is taking care of it.

Now, as this is probably the last time that I shall be out after

nightfall this winter, I must say that I have come here with a

mission, and I would make my errand of value.

Many compliments have been paid to Mr. Carnegie to-night. I was

expecting them. They are very gratifying to me.

I have been a guest of honor myself, and I know what Mr. Carnegie is

experiencing now. It is embarrassing to get compliments and

compliments and only compliments, particularly when he knows as well

as the rest of us that on the other side of him there are all sorts of

things worthy of our condemnation.

Just look at Mr. Carnegie's face. It is fairly scintillating with

fictitious innocence. You would think, looking at him, that he had

never committed a crime in his life. But no- look at his

pestiferious simplified spelling. You can't any of you imagine what

a crime that has been. Torquemada was nothing to Mr. Carnegie. That

old fellow shed some blood in the Inquisition, but Mr. Carnegie has

brought destruction to the entire race. I know he didn't mean it to be

a crime, but it was, just the same. He's got us all so we can't

spell anything.

The trouble with him is that he attacked orthography at the wrong

end. He meant well, but he attacked the symptoms and not the cause

of the disease. He ought to have gone to work on the alphabet. There's

not a vowel in it with a definite value, and not a consonant that

you can hitch anything to. Look at the "h's" distributed all around.

There's "gherkin." What are you going to do with the "h" in that? What

the devil's the use of "h" in gherkin, I'd like to know. It's one

thing I admire the English for: they just don't mind anything about

them at all.

But look at the "pneumatics" and the "pneumonias" and the rest of

them. A real reform would settle them once and for all, and wind up by

giving us an alphabet that we wouldn't have to spell with at all,

instead of this present silly alphabet, which I fancy was invented

by a drunken thief. Why, there isn't a man who doesn't have to throw

out about fifteen hundred words a day when he writes his letters

because he can't spell them! It's like trying to do a St. Vitus's

dance with wooden legs.

Now I'll bet there isn't a man here who can spell "pterodactyl," not

even the prisoner at the bar. I'd like to hear him try once- but not

in public, for it's too near Sunday, when all extravagant histrionic

entertainments are barred. I'd like to hear him try in private, and

when he got through trying to spell "pterodactyl" you wouldn't know

whether it was a fish or a beast or a bird, and whether it flew on its

legs or walked with its wings. The chances are that he would give it

tusks and make it lay eggs.

Let's get Mr. Carnegie to reform the alphabet, and we'll pray for

him- if he'll take the risk.

If we had adequate, competent vowels, with a system of accents,

giving to each vowel its own soul and value, so every shade of that

vowel would be shown in its accent, there is not a word in any

tongue that we could not spell accurately. That would be competent,

adequate, simplified spelling, in contrast to the clipping, the hair

punching, the carbuncles, and the cancers which go by the name of

simplified spelling. If I ask you what b-o-w spells you can't tell

me unless you know which b-o-w I mean, and it is the same with

r-o-w, b-o-r-e, and the whole family of words which were born out of

lawful wedlock and don't know their own origin.

Now, if we had an alphabet that was adequate and competent,

instead of inadequate and incompetent, things would be different.

Spelling reform has only made it bald-headed and unsightly. There is

the whole tribe of them, "row" and "read" and "lead"- a whole family

who don't know who they are. I ask you to pronounce s-o-w, and you ask

me what kind of a one.

If we had a sane, determinate alphabet, instead of a hospital of

comminuted eunuchs, you would know whether one referred to the act

of a man casting the seed over the ploughed land or whether one wished

to recall the lady hog and the future ham.

It's a rotten alphabet. I appoint Mr. Carnegie to get after it,

and leave simplified spelling alone. Simplified spelling brought about

sun-spots, the San Francisco earthquake, and the recent business

depression, which we would never have had if spelling had been left

all alone.

Now, I hope I have soothed Mr. Carnegie and made him more

comfortable than he would have been had he received only compliment

after compliment, and I wish to say to him that simplified spelling is

all right, but, like chastity, you can carry it too far.

SPELLING AND PICTURES.

ADDRESS AT THE ANNUAL DINNER OF THE ASSOCIATED PRESS,

AT THE WALDORF-ASTORIA, SEPTEMBER 18, 1906.

I AM here to make an appeal to the nations in behalf of the

simplified spelling. I have come here because they cannot all be

reached except through you. There are only two forces that can carry

light to all the corners of the globe- only two- the sun in the

heavens and the Associated Press down here. I may seem to be

flattering the sun, but I do not mean it so; I am meaning only to be

just and fair all around. You speak with a million voices; no one

can reach so many races, so many hearts and intellects, as you- except

Rudyard Kipling, and he cannot do it without your help. If the

Associated Press will adopt and use our simplified forms, and thus

spread them to the ends of the earth, covering the whole spacious

planet with them as with a garden of flowers, our difficulties are

at an end.

Every day of the three hundred and sixty-five the only pages of

the world's countless newspapers that are read by all the human beings

and angels and devils that can read, are these pages that are built

out of Associated Press despatches. And so I beg you, I beseech you-

oh, I implore you to spell them in our simplified forms. Do this

daily, constantly, persistently, for three months- only three

months- it is all I ask. The infallible result?- victory, victory

all down the line. For by that time all eyes here and above and

below will have become adjusted to the change and in love with it, and

the present clumsy and ragged forms will be grotesque to the eye and

revolting to the soul. And we shall be rid of phthisis and phthisic

and pneumonia and pneumatics, and diphtheria and pterodactyl, and

all those other insane words which no man addicted to the simple

Christian life can try to spell and not lose some of the bloom of

his piety in the demoralizing attempt. Do not doubt it. We are

chameleons, and our partialities and prejudices change places with

an easy and blessed facility, and we are soon wonted to the change and

happy in it. We do not regret our old, yellow fangs and snags and

tushes after we have worn nice, fresh, uniform store teeth a while.

Do I seem to be seeking the good of the world? That is the idea.

It is my public attitude; privately I am merely seeking my own profit.

We all do it, but it is sound and it is virtuous, for no public

interest is anything other or nobler than a massed accumulation of

private interests. In 1883, when the simplified-spelling movement

first tried to make a noise, I was indifferent to it; more- I even

irreverently scoffed at it. What I needed was an object-lesson, you

see. It is the only way to teach some people. Very well, I got it.

At that time I was scrambling along, earning the family's bread on

magazine work at seven cents a word, compound words at single rates,

just as it is in the dark present. I was the property of a magazine, a

seven-cent slave under a boiler-iron contract. One day there came a

note from the editor requiring me to write ten pages on this revolting

text: "Considerations concerning the alleged subterranean holophotal

extemporaneousness of the conchyliaceous superimbrication of the

Ornithorhyncus, as foreshadowed by the unintelligibility of its

plesiosaurian anisodactylous aspects."

Ten pages of that. Each and every word a seventeen-jointed

vestibuled railroad train. Seven cents a word. I saw starvation

staring the family in the face. I went to the editor, and I took a

stenographer along so as to have the interview down in black and

white, for no magazine editor can ever remember any part of a business

talk except the part that's got graft in it for him and the

magazine. I said, "Read that text, Jackson, and let it go on the

record; read it out loud." He read it: "Considerations concerning

the alleged subterranean holophotal extemporaneousness of the

conchyliaceous superimbrication of the Ornithorhyncus, as foreshadowed

by the unintelligibility of its plesiosaurian anisodactylous aspects."

I said, "You want ten pages of those rumbling, great, long, summer

thunderpeals, and you expect to get them at seven cents a peal?"

He said, "A word's a word, and seven cents is the contract; what are

you going to do about it?" I said, "Jackson, this is cold-blooded

oppression. What's an average English word?"

He said, "Six letters."

I said, "Nothing of the kind; that's French, and includes the spaces

between the words; an average English word is four letters and a half.

By hard, honest labor I've dug all the large words out of my

vocabulary and shaved it down till the average is three letters and

a half. I can put one thousand and two hundred words on your page, and

there's not another man alive that can come within two hundred of

it. My page is worth eighty-four dollars to me. It takes exactly as

long to fill your magazine page with long words as it does with

short ones- four hours. Now, then, look at the criminal injustice of

this requirement of yours. I am careful, I am economical of my time

and labor. For the family's sake I've got to be so. So I never write

'metropolis' for seven cents, because I can get the same money for

'city.' I never write 'policeman,' because I can get the same price

for 'cop.' And so on and so on. I never write 'valetudinarian' at all,

for not even hunger and wretchedness can humble me to the point

where I will do a word like that for seven cents; I wouldn't do it for

fifteen. Examine your obscene text, please, count the words."

He counted and said it was twenty-four. I asked him to count the

letters. He made it two hundred and three.

I said, "Now, I hope you see the whole size of your crime. With my

vocabulary I would make sixty words out of those two hundred and

five letters, and get four dollars and twenty cents for it; whereas

for your inhuman twenty-four I would get only one dollar and

sixty-eight cents. Ten pages of these sky-scrapers of yours would

pay me only about three hundred dollars; in my simplified vocabulary

the same space and the same labor would pay me eight hundred and forty

dollars. I do not wish to work upon this scandalous job by the

piece. I want to be hired by the year." He coldly refused. I said:

"Then for the sake of the family, if you have no feeling for me, you

ought at least to allow me overtime on that word

extemporaneousness." Again he coldly refused. I seldom say a harsh

word to any one, but I was not master of myself then, and I spoke

right out and called him an anisodactylous plesiosaurian

conchyliaceous Ornithorhyneus, and rotten to the heart with holophotal

subterranean extemporaneousness. God forgive me for that wanton crime;

he lived only two hours.

From that day to this I have been a devoted and hard-working

member of the heaven-born institution, the International Association

for the Prevention of Cruelty to Authors, and now I am laboring with

Carnegie's Simplified Committee, and with my heart in the work....

Now then, let us look at this mighty question reasonably,

rationally, sanely- yes, and calmly, not excitedly. What is the real

function, the essential function, the supreme function, of language?

Isn't it merely to convey ideas and emotions? Certainly. Then if we

can do it with words of fonetic brevity and compactness, why keep

the present cumbersome forms? But can we? Yes. I hold in my hand the

proof of it. Here is a letter written by a woman, right out of her

heart of hearts. I think she never saw a spelling-book in her life.

The spelling is her own. There isn't a waste letter in it anywhere. It

reduces the fonetics to the last gasp- it squeezes the surplusage

out of every word- there's no spelling that can begin with it on

this planet outside of the White House. And as for the punctuation,

there isn't any. It is all one sentence, eagerly and breathlessly

uttered, without break or pause in it anywhere. The letter is

absolutely genuine- I have the proofs of that in my possession. I

can't stop to spell the words for you, but you can take the letter

presently and comfort your eyes with it. I will read the letter:

"Miss- dear friend I took some Close into the armerry and give

them to you to Send too the suffrers out to California and i Hate to

truble you but i got to have one of them Back it was a black oll wolle

Shevyott With a jacket to Mach trimed Kind of Fancy no 38 Burst

measure and passy menterry acrost the front And the color i woodent

Trubble you but it belonged to my brothers wife and she is Mad about

it i thoght she was willin but she want she says she want done with it

and she was going to Wear it a Spell longer she ant so free harted

as what i am and she Has got more to do with Than i have having a

Husband to Work and slave For her i gess you remember Me I am shot and

stout and light complected i torked with you quite a spell about the

suffrars and said it was orful about that erth quake I shoodent wondar

if they had another one rite off seeine general Condision of the

country is Kind of Explossive i hate to take that Black dress away

from the suffrars but i will hunt round And see if i can get another

One if i can i will call to the armerry for it if you will jest lay it

asside so no more at present from your True friend

i liked your

appearance very Much"

Now you see what simplified spelling can do.

It can convey any fact you need to convey; and it can pour out

emotions like a sewer. I beg you, I beseech you, to adopt our

spelling, and print all your despatches in it.

Now I wish to say just one entirely serious word:

I have reached a time of life, seventy years and a half, where

none of the concerns of this world have much interest for me

personally. I think I can speak dispassionately upon this matter,

because in the little while that I have got to remain here I can get

along very well with these old-fashioned forms, and I don't propose to

make any trouble about it at all. I shall soon be where they won't

care how I spell so long as I keep the Sabbath.

There are eighty-two millions of us people that use this

orthography, and it ought to be simplified in our behalf, but it is

kept in its present condition to satisfy one million people who like

to have their literature in the old form. That looks to me to be

rather selfish, and we keep the forms as they are while we have got

one million people coming in here from foreign countries every year

and they have got to struggle with this orthography of ours, and it

keeps them back and damages their citizenship for years until they

learn to spell the language, if they ever do learn. This is merely

sentimental argument.

People say it is the spelling of Chaucer and Spenser and Shakespeare

and a lot of other people who do not know how to spell anyway, and

it has been transmitted to us and we preserved it and wish to preserve

it because of its ancient and hallowed associations.

Now, I don't see that there is any real argument about that. If that

argument is good, then it would be a good argument not to banish the

flies and the cockroaches from hospitals because they have been

there so long that the patients have got used to them and they feel

a tenderness for them on account of the associations. Why, it is

like preserving a cancer in a family because it is a family cancer,

and we are bound to it by the test of affection and reverence and old,

mouldy antiquity.

I think that this declaration to improve this orthography of ours is

our family cancer, and I wish we could reconcile ourselves to have

it cut out and let the family cancer go.

Now, you see before you the wreck and ruin of what was once a

young person like yourselves. I am exhausted by the heat of the day. I

must take what is left of this wreck and run out of your presence

and carry it away to my home and spread it out there and sleep the

sleep of the righteous. There is nothing much left of me but my age

and my righteousness, but I leave with you my love and my blessing,

and may you always keep your youth.

BOOKS AND BURGLARS.

ADDRESS TO THE REDDING (CONN.) LIBRARY ASSOCIATION,

OCTOBER 28, 1908.

SUPPOSE this library had been in operation a few weeks ago, and

the burglars who happened along and broke into my house- taking a

lot of things they didn't need, and for that matter which I didn't

need- had first made entry into this institution.

Picture them seated here on the floor, poring by the light of

their dark-lanterns over some of the books they found, and thus

absorbing moral truths and getting a moral uplift. The whole course of

their lives would have been changed. As it was, they kept straight

on in their immoral way and were sent to jail.

For all we know, they may next be sent to Congress.

And, speaking of burglars, let us not speak of them too harshly.

Now, I have known so many burglars- not exactly known, but so many

of them have come near me in my various dwelling-places, that I am

disposed to allow them credit for whatever good qualities they

possess.

Chief among these, and, indeed, the only one I just now think of, is

their great care while doing business to avoid disturbing people's

sleep.

Noiseless as they may be while at work, however, the effect of their

visitation is to murder sleep later on.

Now we are prepared for these visitors. All sorts of alarm devices

have been put in the house, and the ground for half a mile around it

has been electrified. The burglar who steps within this danger zone

will set loose a bedlam of sounds, and spring into readiness for

action our elaborate system of defences. As for the fate of the

trespasser, do not seek to know that. He will never be heard of more.

AUTHORS' CLUB.

ADDRESS AT THE DINNER GIVEN IN HONOR OF MR. CLEMENS,

LONDON, JUNE, 1899.

Mr. Clemens was introduced by Sir Walter Besant.

IT does not embarrass me to hear my books praised so much. It only

pleases and delights me. I have not gone beyond the age when

embarrassment is possible, but I have reached the age when I know

how to conceal it. It is such a satisfaction to me to hear Sir

Walter Besant, who is much more capable than I to judge of my work,

deliver a judgment which is such a contentment to my spirit.

Well, I have thought well of the books myself, but I think more of

them now. It charms me also to hear Sir Spencer Walpole deliver a

similar judgment, and I shall treasure his remarks also. I shall not

discount the praises in any possible way. When I report them to my

family they shall lose nothing. There are, however, certain heredities

which come down to us which our writings of the present day may be

traced to. I, for instance, read the Walpole Letters when I was a boy.

I absorbed them, gathered in their grace, wit, and humor, and put them

away to be used by-and-by. One does that so unconsciously with

things one really likes. I am reminded now of what use those letters

have been to me.

They must not claim credit in America for what was really written in

another form so long ago. They must only claim that I trimmed this,

that, and the other, and so changed their appearance as to make them

seem to be original. You now see what modesty I have in stock. But

it has taken long practice to get it there.

But I must not stand here talking. I merely meant to get up and give

my thanks for the pleasant things that preceding speakers have said of

me. I wish also to extend my thanks to the Authors' Club for

constituting me a member, at a reasonable price per year, and for

giving me the benefit of your legal adviser.

I believe you keep a lawyer. I have always kept a lawyer, too,

though I have never made anything out of him. It is service to an

author to have a lawyer. There is something so disagreeable in

having a personal contact with a publisher. So it is better to work

through a lawyer- and lose your case. I understand that the publishers

have been meeting together also like us. I don't know what for, but

possibly they are devising new and mysterious ways for remunerating

authors. I only wish now to thank you for electing me a member of this

club- I believe I have paid my dues- and to thank you again for the

pleasant things you have said of me.

Last February, when Rudyard Kipling was ill in America, the sympathy

which was poured out to him was genuine and sincere, and I believe

that which cost Kipling so much will bring England and America

closer together. I have been proud and pleased to see this growing

affection and respect between the two countries. I hope it will

continue to grow, and, please God, it will continue to grow. I trust

we authors will leave to posterity, if we have nothing else to

leave, a friendship between England and America that will count for

much. I will now confess that I have been engaged for the past eight

days in compiling a publication. I have brought it here to lay at your

feet. I do not ask your indulgence in presenting it, but for your

applause.

Here it is: "Since England and America may be joined together in

Kipling, may they not be severed in 'Twain.'"

BOOKSELLERS

BOOKSELLERS.

Address at banquet on Wednesday evening, May 20, 1908, of the

American Booksellers' Association, which included most of the

leading booksellers of America, held at the rooms of the Aldine

Association, New York.

THIS annual gathering of booksellers from all over America comes

together ostensibly to eat and drink, but really to discuss

business; therefore I am required to talk shop. I am required to

furnish a statement of the indebtedness under which I lie to you

gentlemen for your help in enabling we to earn my living. For

something over forty years I have acquired my bread by print,

beginning with The Innocents Abroad, followed at intervals of a year

or so by Roughing It, Tom Sawyer, Gilded Age, and so on. For

thirty-six years my books were sold by subscription. You are not

interested in those years, but only in the four which have since

followed. The books passed into the hands of my present publishers

at the beginning of 1904, and you then became the providers of my

diet. I think I may say, without flattering you, that you have done

exceedingly well by me. Exceedingly well is not too strong a phrase,

since the official statistics show that in four years you have sold

twice as many volumes of my venerable books as my contract with my

publishers bound you and them to sell in five years. To your sorrow

you are aware that frequently, much too frequently, when a book gets

to be five or ten years old its annual sale shrinks to two or three

hundred copies, and after an added ten or twenty years ceases to sell.

But you sell thousands of my moss-backed old books every year- the

youngest of them being books that range from fifteen to twenty-seven

years old, and the oldest reaching back to thirty-five and forty.

By the terms of my contract my publishers had to account to me for

50,000 volumes per year for five years, and pay me for them whether

they sold them or not. It is at this point that you gentlemen come in,

for it was your business to unload 250,000 volumes upon the public

in five years if you possibly could. Have you succeeded? Yes, you

have- and more. For in four years, with a year still to spare, you

have sold the 250,000 volumes, and 240,000 besides.

Your sales have increased each year. In the first year you sold

90,328, in the second year, 104,851; in the third, 133,975; in the

fourth year- which was last year- you sold 160,000. The aggregate

for the four years is 500,000 volumes lacking 11,000.

Of the oldest book, The Innocents Abroad,- now forty years old-

you sold upward of 46,000 copies in the four years; of Roughing It-

now thirty-eight years old, I think- you sold 40,334; of Tom Sawyer,

41,000. And so on.

And there is one thing that is peculiarly gratifying to me: the

Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc is a serious book; I wrote it

for love, and never expected it to sell, but you have pleasantly

disappointed me in that matter. In youth hands its sale has

increased each year. In 1904 you sold 1726 copies; in 1905, 2445; in

1906, 5381; and last year, 6574.

"MARK TWAIN'S FIRST APPEARANCE."

On October 5, 1906, Mr. Clemens, following a musical recital by

his daughter in Norfolk, Conn., addressed her audience on the

subject of stage-fright. He thanked the people for making things as

easy as possible for his daughter's American debut as a contralto, and

then told of his first experience before the public.

MY heart goes out in sympathy to any one who is making his first

appearance before an audience of human beings. By a direct process

of memory I go back forty years, less one month- for I'm older than

I look.

I recall the occasion of my first appearance. San Francisco knew

me then only as a reporter, and I was to make my bow to San

Francisco as a lecturer. I knew that nothing short of compulsion would

get me to the theatre. So I bound myself by a hard-and-fast contract

so that I could not escape. I got to the theatre forty-five minutes

before the hour set for the lecture. My knees were shaking so that I

didn't know whether I could stand up. If there is an awful, horrible

malady in the world, it is stage-fright- and sea-sickness. They are

a pair. I had stage-fright then for the first and last time. I was

only seasick once, too. It was on a little ship on which there were

two hundred other passengers. I- was- sick. I was so sick that there

wasn't any left for those other two hundred passengers.

It was dark and lonely behind the scenes in that theatre, and I

peeked through the little peek-holes they have in theatre curtains and

looked into the big auditorium. That was dark and empty, too.

By-and-by it lighted up, and the audience began to arrive.

I had got a number of friends of mine, stalwart men, to sprinkle

themselves through the audience armed with big clubs. Every time I

said anything they could possibly guess I intended to be funny they

were to pound those clubs on the floor. Then there was a kind lady

in a box up there, also a good friend of mine, the wife of the

Governor. She was to watch me intently, and whenever I glanced

toward her she was going to deliver a gubernatorial laugh that would

lead the whole audience into applause.

At last I began. I had the manuscript tucked under a United States

flag in front of me where I could get at it in case of need. But I

managed to get started without it. I walked up and down- I was young

in those days and needed the exercise- and talked and talked.

Right in the middle of the speech I had placed a gem. I had put in a

moving, pathetic part which was to get at the hearts and souls of my

hearers. When I delivered it they did just what I hoped and

expected. They sat silent and awed. I had touched them. Then I

happened to glance up at the box where the Governor's wife was- you

know what happened.

Well, after the first agonizing five minutes, my stage-fright left

me, never to return. I know if I was going to be hanged I could get up

and make a good showing, and I intend to. But I shall never forget

my feelings before the agony left me, and I got up here to thank you

for her for helping my daughter, by your kindness, to live through her

first appearance. And I want to thank you for your appreciation of her

singing, which is, by-the-way, hereditary.

MORALS AND MEMORY.

Mr. Clemens was the guest of honor at a reception held at Barnard

College (Columbia University), March 7, 1906, by the Barnard Union.

One of the young ladies presented Mr. Clemens, and thanked him for his

amiability in coming to make them an address. She closed with the

expression of the great joy it gave her fellow-collegians, "because we

all love you."

IF any one here loves me, she has my sincere thanks. Nay, if any one

here is so good as to love me- why, I'll be a brother to her. She

shall have my sincere, warm, unsullied affection. When I was coming up

in the car with the very kind young lady who was delegated to show

me the way, she asked me what I was going to talk about. And I said

I wasn't sure. I said I had some illustrations, and I was going to

bring them in. I said I was certain to give those illustrations, but

that I hadn't the faintest notion what they were going to illustrate.

Now, I've been thinking it over in this forest glade [indicating the

woods of Arcady on the scene setting], and I've decided to work them

in with something about morals and the caprices of memory. That

seems to me to be a pretty good subject. You see, everybody has a

memory and it's pretty sure to have caprices. And, of course,

everybody has morals.

It's my opinion that every one I know has morals, though I

wouldn't like to ask. I know I have. But I'd rather teach them than

practice them any day. "Give them to others"- that's my motto. Then

you never have any use for them when you're left without. Now,

speaking of the caprices of memory in general, and of mine in

particular, it's strange to think of all the tricks this little mental

process plays on us. Here we're endowed with a faculty of mind that

ought to be more supremely serviceable to us than them all. And what

happens? This memory of ours stores up a perfect record of the most

useless facts and anecdotes and experiences. And all the things that

we ought to know- that we need to know- that we'd profit by knowing-

it casts aside with the careless indifference of a girl refusing her

true lover. It's terrible to think of this phenomenon. I tremble in

all my members when I consider all the really valuable things that

I've forgotten in seventy years- when I meditate upon the caprices

of my memory.

There's a bird out in California that is one perfect symbol of the

human memory. I've forgotten the bird's name (just because it would be

valuable for me to know it- to recall it to your own minds, perhaps).

But this fool of a creature goes around collecting the most

ridiculous things you can imagine and storing them up. He never

selects a thing that could ever prove of the slightest help to him;

but he goes about gathering iron forks, and spoons, and tin cans,

and broken mouse-traps- all sorts of rubbish that is difficult for him

to carry and yet be any use when he gets it. Why, that bird will go by

a gold watch to bring back one of those patent cake-pans.

Now, my mind is just like that, and my mind isn't very different

from yours- and so our minds are just like that bird. We pass by

what would be of inestimable value to us, and pack our memories with

the most trivial odds and ends that never by any chance, under any

circumstances whatsoever, could be of the slightest use to any one.

Now, things that I have remembered are constantly popping into my

head. And I am repeatedly startled by the vividness with which they

recur to me after the lapse of years and their utter uselessness in

being remembered at all.

I was thinking over some on my way up here. They were the

illustrations I spoke about to the young lady on the way up. And

I've come to the conclusion, curious though it is, that I can use

every one of these freaks of memory to teach you all a lesson. I'm

convinced that each one has its moral. And I think it's my duty to

hand the moral on to you.

Now, I recall that when I was a boy I was a good boy- I was a very

good boy. Why, I was the best boy in my school. I was the best boy

in that little Mississippi town where I lived. The population was only

about twenty million. You may not believe it, but I was the best boy

in that State- and in the United States, for that matter.

But I don't know why I never heard any one say that but myself. I

always recognized it. But even those nearest and dearest to me

couldn't seem to see it. My mother, especially, seemed to think

there was something wrong with that estimate. And she never got over

that prejudice.

Now, when my mother got to be eighty-five years old her memory

failed her. She forgot little threads that hold life's patches of

meaning together. She was living out West then, and I went on to visit

her.

I hadn't seen my mother in a year or so. And when I got there she

knew my face; knew I was married; knew I had a family, and that I

was living, with them. But she couldn't, for the life of her, tell

my name or who I was. So I told her I was her boy.

"But you don't live with me," she said.

"No," said I, "I'm living in Rochester."

"What are you doing there?"

"Going to school."

"Large school?"

"Very large."

"All boys?"

"All boys."

"And how do you stand?" said my mother.

"I'm the best boy in that school," I answered.

"Well," said my mother, with a return of her old fire, "I'd like

to know what the other boys are like."

Now, one point in this story is the fact that my mother's mind

went back to my school days, and remembered my little youthful

self-prejudice when she'd forgotten everything else about me.

The other point is the moral. There's one there that you will find

if you search for it.

Now, here's something else I remember. It's about the first time I

ever stole a watermelon. "Stole" is a strong word. Stole? Stole? No, I

don't mean that. It was the first time I ever withdrew a watermelon.

It was the first time I ever extracted a watermelon. That is exactly

the word I want- "extracted." It is definite. It is precise. It

perfectly conveys my idea. Its use in dentistry connotes the

delicate shade of meaning I am looking for. You know we never

extract our own teeth.

And it was not my watermelon that I extracted. I extracted that

watermelon from a farmer's wagon while he was inside negotiating

with another customer. I carried that watermelon to one of the

secluded recesses of the lumber-yard, and there I broke it open.

It was a green watermelon.

Well, do you know when I saw that I began to feel sorry- sorry-

sorry. It seemed to me that I had done wrong. I reflected deeply. I

reflected that I was young- I think I was just eleven. But I knew that

though immature I did not lack moral advancement. I knew what a boy

ought to do who had extracted a watermelon like that.

I considered George Washington, and what action he would have

taken under similar circumstances. Then I knew there was just one

thing to make me feel right inside, and that was- Restitution.

So I said to myself: "I will do that. I will take that green

watermelon back where I got it from." And the minute I had said it I

felt that great moral uplift that comes to you when you've made a

noble resolution.

So I gathered up the biggest fragments, and I carried them back to

the farmer's wagon, and I restored the watermelon- what was left of

it. And I made him give me a good one in place of it, too.

And I told him he ought to be ashamed of himself going around

working off his worthless, old, green watermelons on trusting

purchasers who had to rely on him. How could they tell from the

outside whether the melons were good or not? That was his business.

And if he didn't reform, I told him I'd see that he didn't get my more

of my trade- nor anybody else's I knew, if I could help it.

You know that man was as contrite as a revivalist's last convert. He

said be was all broken up to think I'd gotten a green watermelon. He

promised me he would never carry another green watermelon if he

starved for it. And he drove off- a better man.

Now, do you see what I did for that man? He was on a downward

path, and I rescued him. But all I got out of it was a watermelon.

Yet I'd rather have that memory- just that memory of the good I

did for that depraved farmer- than all the material gain you can think

of. Look at the lesson he got! I never got anything like that from it.

But I ought to be satisfied. I was only eleven years old, but I

secured everlasting benefit to other people.

The moral in this is perfectly clear, and I think there's one in the

next memory I'm going to tell you about.

To go back to my childhood, there's another little incident that

comes to me from which you can draw even another moral. It's about one

of the times I went fishing. You see, in our house there was a sort of

family prejudice against going fishing if you hadn't permission. But

it would frequently be bad judgment to ask. So I went fishing

secretly, as it were- way up the Mississippi. It was an exquisitely

happy trip, I recall, with a very pleasant sensation.

Well, while I was away there was a tragedy in our town. A

stranger, stopping over on his way East from California, was stabbed

to death in an unseemly brawl.

Now, my father was justice of the peace, and because he was

justice of the peace he was coroner; and since he was coroner he was

also constable; and being constable he was sheriff; and out of

consideration for his holding the office of sheriff he was likewise

county clerk and a dozen other officials I don't think of just this

minute.

I thought he had power of life or death; only he didn't use it

over other boys. He was sort of an austere man. Somehow I didn't

like being round him when I'd done anything he disapproved of. So

that's the reason I wasn't often around.

Well, when this gentleman got knifed they communicated with the

proper authority, the coroner, and they laid the corpse out in the

coroner's office- our front sitting-room- in preparation for the

inquest the next morning.

About 9 or 10 o'clock I got back from fishing. It was a little too

late for me to be received by my folks, so I took my shoes off and

slipped noiselessly up the back way to the sitting-room. I was very

tired, and I didn't wish to disturb my people. So I groped my way to

the sofa and lay down.

Now, I didn't know anything of what had happened during my

absence. But I was sort of nervous on my own account- afraid of

being caught, and rather dubious about the morning affair. And I had

been lying there a few moments when my eyes gradually got used to

the darkness, and I became aware of something on the other side of the

room.

It was something foreign to the apartment. It had an uncanny

appearance. And I sat up looking very hard, and wondering what in

heaven this long, formless, vicious-looking thing might be.

First I thought I'd go and see. Then I thought, "Never mind that."

Mind you, I had no cowardly sensations whatever, but it didn't

seem exactly prudent to investigate. But I somehow couldn't keep my

eyes off the thing. And the more I looked at it the more

disagreeably it grew on me. But I was resolved to play the man. So I

decided to turn over and count a hundred, and let the patch of

moonlight creep up and show me what the dickens it was.

Well, I turned over and tried to count, but I couldn't keep my

mind on it. I kept thinking of that grewsome mass. I was losing

count all the time, and going back and beginning over again. Oh no;

I wasn't frightened- just annoyed. But by the time I'd gotten to the

century mark I turned cautiously over and opened my eyes with great

fortitude.

The moonlight revealed to me a marble-white human hand. Well,

maybe I wasn't embarrassed! But then that changed to a creepy

feeling again, and I thought I'd try the counting again. I don't

know how many hours or weeks it was that I lay there counting hard.

But the moonlight crept up that white arm, and it showed me a lead

face and a terrible wound over the heart.

I could scarcely say that I was terror-stricken or anything like

that. But somehow his eyes interested me so that I went right out of

the window. I didn't need the sash. But it seemed easier to take it

than leave it behind.

Now, let that teach you a lesson- I don't know just what it is.

But at seventy years old I find that memory of peculiar value to me. I

have been unconsciously guided by it all these years. Things that

seemed pigeon-holed and remote are a perpetual influence. Yes,

you're taught in so many ways. And you're so felicitously taught

when you don't know it.

Here's something else that taught me a good deal.

When I was seventeen I was very bashful, and a sixteen-year-old girl

came to stay a week with us. She was a peach, and I was seized with

a happiness not of this world.

One evening my mother suggested that, to entertain her, I take I

take her to the theatre. I didn't really like to, because I was

seventeen and sensitive about appearing in the streets With a girl.

I couldn't see my way to enjoying my delight in public. But we went.

I didn't feel very happy. I couldn't seem to keep my mind on the

play. I became unconscious after a while, that that was due less to my

lovely company than my boots. They were sweet to look upon, as

smooth as skin, but fitted ten times as close. I got oblivious to

the play and the girl and the other people and everything but my boots

until I hitched one partly off. The sensation was sensuously

perfect. I couldn't help it. I had to get the other off, partly.

Then I was obliged to get them off altogether, except that I kept my

feet in the legs so they couldn't get away.

From that time I enjoyed the play. But the first thing I knew the

curtain came down, like that, without my notice, and I hadn't any

boots on. I tugged strenuously. And the people in our row got up and

fussed and said things until the peach and I simply had to move on.

We moved- the girl on one arm and the boots under the other.

We walked home that way, sixteen blocks, with a retinue a mile long.

Every time we passed a lamp-post death gripped me at the throat. But

we got home- and I had on white socks.

If I live to be nine hundred and ninety-nine years old I don't

suppose I could ever forget that walk. I remember it about as keenly

as the chagrin I suffered on another occasion.

At one time in our domestic history we had a colored butler who

had a failing. He could never remember to ask people who came to the

door to state their business. So I used to buffer a good many calls

unnecessarily.

One morning when I was especially busy he brought me a card engraved

With a name I did not know. So I said, "What does he wish to see me

for?" and Sylvester said, "Ah couldn't ask him, sah; he wuz a

genlmun." "Return instantly," I thundered, "and inquire his mission.

Ask him what's his game." Well, Sylvester returned with the

announcement that he had lightning-rods to sell. "Indeed," said I,

"things are coming to a fine pass when lightning-rod agents send up

engraved cards." "He has pictures," added Sylvester. "Pictures,

indeed! He may be peddling etchings. Has he a Russia leather case?"

But Sylvester was too frightened to remember. I said, "I am going down

to make it hot for that upstart!"

I went down the stairs, working up my temper all the way. When I got

to the parlor I was in a fine frenzy concealed beneath a veneer of

frigid courtesy. And when I looked in the door, sure enough he had a

Russia leather case in his hand. But I didn't happen to notice that it

was our Russia leather case.

And if you'd believe me, that man was sitting with a whole gallery

of etchings spread out before him. But I didn't happen to notice

that they were our etchings, spread out by some member of my family

for some unguessed purpose.

Very curtly I asked the gentleman his business. With a surprised,

timid manner he faltered that he had met my wife and daughter at

Onteora, and they had asked him to call. Fine lie, I thought, and I

froze him.

He seemed to be kind of nonplussed, and sat there fingering the

etchings in the case until I told him he needn't bother, because we

had those. That pleased him so much that he leaned over, in an

embarrassed way, to pick up another from the floor. But I stopped him.

I said, "We've got that, too." He seemed pitifully amazed, but I was

congratulating myself on my great success.

Finally the gentleman asked where Mr. Winton lived; he'd met him

in the mountains, too. So I said I'd show him gladly. And I did on the

spot. And when he was gone I felt queer, because there were all his

etchings spread out on the floor.

Well, my wife came in and asked me who had been in. I showed her the

card, and told her all exultantly. To my dismay she nearly fainted.

She told me he had been a most kind friend to them in the country, and

had forgotten to tell me that he was expected our way. And she

pushed me out of the door, and commanded me to get over to the Wintons

in a hurry and get him back.

I came into the drawing-room, where Mrs. Winton was sitting up

very stiff in a chair, beating me at my own game. Well, I began to put

another light on things. Before many seconds Mrs. Winton saw it was

time to change her temperature. In five minutes I had asked the man to

luncheon, and she to dinner, and so on.

We made that fellow change his trip and stay a week, and we gave him

the time of his life. Why, I don't believe we let him get sober the

whole time.

I trust that you will carry away some good thought from these

lessons I have given you, and that the memory of them will inspire you

to higher things, and elevate you to plans far above the old- and-

and-

And I tell you one thing, young ladies: I've had a better time

with you to-day than with that peach fifty-three years ago.

QUEEN VICTORIA.

ADDRESS TO THE BRITISH SCHOOLS AND UNIVERSITIES CLUB

AT DELMONICO'S, MONDAY, MAY 25, 1908, IN HONOR OF

QUEEN VICTORIA'S BIRTHDAY.

Mr. Clemens told the story of his duel with a rival editor: how he

practised firing at a barn door and failed to hit it; but a friend

of his took off the head of a little bird at thirty-five yards and

attributed the shot to Mark Twain. The duel did not take place. Mr.

Clemens continued as follows:

IT also happened that I was the means of stopping the duelling in

Nevada, for a law was passed sending all duellists to jail for two

years, and the governor, hearing of my marksmanship, said that if he

got me I should go to prison for the full term. That's why I left

Nevada, and I have not been there since.

You do me a high honor, indeed, in selecting me to speak of my

country in this commemoration of the birthday of that noble lady whose

life was consecrated to the virtues and the humanities and to the

promotion of lofty ideals, and was a model upon which many a humbler

life was formed and made beautiful while she lived, and upon which

many such lives will still be formed in the generations that are to

come- life which finds its just image in the star which falls out of

its place in the sky and out of existence, but whose light still

streams with unfaded lustre across the abysses of space long after its

fires have been extinguished at their source.

As a woman the Queen was all that the most exacting standards

could require. As a far-reaching and effective beneficent moral

force she had no peer in her time among either monarchs or

commoners. As a monarch she was without reproach in her great

office. We may not venture, perhaps, to say so sweeping a thing as

this in cold blood about any monarch that preceded her upon either her

own throne or upon any other. It is a colossal eulogy, but it is

justified.

In those qualities of the heart which beget affection in all sorts

and conditions of men she was rich, surprisingly rich, and for this

she will still be remembered and revered in the far-off ages when

the political glories of her reign shall have faded from vital history

and fallen to a place in that scrap-heap of unverifiable odds and ends

which we call tradition. Which is to say, in briefer phrase, that

her name will live always. And with it her character- a fame rare in

the history of thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers, since

it will not rest upon harvested selfish and sordid ambitions, but upon

love, earned and freely vouchsafed. She mended broken hearts where she

could, but she broke none.

What she did for us in America in our time of storm and stress we

shall not forget, and whenever we call it to mind we shall always

remember the wise and righteous mind that guided her in it and

sustained and supported her- Prince Albert's. We need not talk any

idle talk here to-night about either possible or impossible war

between the two countries; there will be no war while we remain sane

and the son of Victoria and Albert sits upon the throne. In

conclusion, I believe I may justly claim to utter the voice of my

country in saying that we hold him in deep honor, and also in

cordially wishing him a long life and a happy reign.

JOAN OF ARC.

ADDRESS AT THE DINNER OF THE SOCIETY OF ILLUSTRATORS,

GIVEN AT THE ALDINE ASSOCIATION CLUB,

DECEMBER 22, 1905.

Just before Mr. Clemens made his speech, a young woman attired as

Joan of Arc, with a page bearing her flag of battle, courtesied

reverently and tendered Mr. Clemens a laurel wreath on a satin pillow.

He tried to speak, but his voice failed from excess of emotion. "I

thank you!" he finally exclaimed, and, pulling himself together, he

began his speech.

NOW there is an illustration [pointing to the retreating Joan of

Arc]. That is exactly what I wanted- precisely what I wanted- when I

was describing to myself Joan of Arc, after studying her history and

her character for twelve years diligently.

That was the product- not the conventional Joan of Arc. Wherever you

find the conventional Joan of Arc in history she is an offence to

anybody who knows the story of that wonderful girl.

Why, she was- she was almost supreme in several details. She had a

marvellous intellect; she had a great heart, had a noble spirit, was

absolutely pure in her character, her feeling, her language, her

words, her everything- she was only eighteen years old.

Now put that heart into such a breast- eighteen years old- and

give it that masterly intellect which showed in the fate, and

furnish it with that almost god-like spirit, and what are you going to

have? The conventional Joan of Arc? Not by any means. That is

impossible. I cannot comprehend any such thing as that.

You must have a creature like that young and fair and beautiful girl

we just saw. And her spirit must look out of the eyes. The figure

should be- the figure should be in harmony with all that, but, oh,

what we get in the conventional picture, and it is always the

conventional picture!

I hope you will allow me to say that your guild, when you take the

conventional, you have got it at second-hand. Certainly, if you had

studied and studied, then you might have something else as a result,

but when you have the common convention you stick to that.

You cannot prevail upon the artist to do it; he always gives you a

Joan of Arc- that lovely creature that started a great career at

thirteen, but whose greatness arrived when she was eighteen; and

merely because she was a girl he cannot see the divinity in her, and

so he paints a peasant, a coarse and lubberly figure- the figure of

a cotton-bale, and he clothes that in the coarsest raiment of the

peasant region- just like a fish-woman, her hair cropped short like

a Russian peasant, and that face of hers, which should be beautiful

and which should radiate all the glories which are in the spirit and

in her heart- that expression in that face is always just the fixed

expression of a ham.

But now Mr. Beard has intimated a moment ago, and so has Sir

Purdon-Clarke also, that the artist, the illustrator, does not often

get the idea of the man whose book he is illustrating. Here is a

very remarkable instance of the other thing in Mr. Beard, who

illustrated a book of mine. You may never have heard of it. I will

tell you about it now- A Yankee in King Arthur's Court.

Now, Beard got everything that I put into that book and a little

more besides. Those pictures of Beard's in that book- oh, from the

first page to the last is one vast sardonic laugh at the trivialities,

the servilities of our poor human race, and also at the professions

and the insolence of priest-craft and king-craft- those creatures that

make slaves of themselves and have not the manliness to shake it

off. Beard put it all in that book. I meant it to be there. I put a

lot of it there and Beard put the rest.

That publisher of mine in Hartford had an eye for the pennies, and

he saved them. He did not waste any on the illustrations. He had a

very good artist- Williams- who had never taken a lesson in drawing.

Everything he did was original. The publisher hired the cheapest

wood-engraver he could find, and in my early books you can see a trace

of that. You can see that if Williams had had a chance he would have

made some very good pictures. He had a good heart and good intentions.

I had a character in the first book he illustrated- The Innocents

Abroad. That was a boy seventeen or eighteen years old- Jack Van

Nostrand- a New York boy, who, to my mind, was a very remarkable

creature. He and I tried to get Williams to understand that boy, and

make a picture of Jack that would be worthy of Jack.

Jack was a most singular combination. He was born and reared in

New York here. He was as delicate in his feelings, as clean and pure

and refined in his feelings as any lovely girl that ever was, but

whenever he expressed a feeling he did it in Bowery slang, and it

was a most curious combination- that delicacy of his and that apparent

coarseness. There was no coarseness inside of Jack at all, and Jack,

in the course of seventeen or eighteen years, had acquired a capital

of ignorance that was marvellous- ignorance of various things, not

of all things. For instance, he did not know anything about the Bible.

He had never been in Sunday-school. Jack got more out of the Holy Land

than anybody else, because the others knew what they were expecting,

but it was a land of surprises to him.

I said in the book that we found him watching a turtle on a log,

stoning that turtle, and he was stoning that turtle because he had

read that "The song of the turtle was heard in the land," and this

turtle wouldn't sing. It sounded absurd, but it was charged on Jack as

a fact, and as he went along through that country he had a proper foil

in an old rebel colonel, who was superintendent and head engineer in a

large Sunday-school in Wheeling, West Virginia. That man was full of

enthusiasm wherever he went, and would stand and deliver himself of

speeches, and Jack would listen to those speeches of the colonel and

wonder.

Jack had made a trip as a child almost across this continent in

the first overland stage-coach. That man's name who ran that line of

stages- well, I declare that name is gone. Well, names will go.

Halliday- ah, that's the name- Ben Halliday, your uncle [turning

to Mr. Carnegie]. That was the fellow- Ben Halliday- and Jack was full

of admiration at the prodigious speed that that line of stages made-

and it was good speed- one hundred and twenty-five miles a day,

going day and night, and it was the event of Jack's life, and there at

the Fords of the Jordan the colonel was inspired to a speech (he was

always making a speech), so he called us up to him. He called up

five sinners and three saints. It has been only lately that Mr.

Carnegie beatified me. And he said: "Here are the Fords of the Jordan-

a monumental place. At this very point, when Moses brought the

children of Israel through- he brought the children of Israel from

Egypt through the desert you see there- he guarded them through that

desert patiently, patiently during forty years, and brought them to

this spot safe and sound. There you see- there is the scene of what

Moses did."

And Jack said: "Moses who?"

"Oh," he says, "Jack, you ought not to ask that! Moses, the great

law-giver! Moses, the great patriot! Moses, the great warrior!

Moses, the great guide, who, as I tell you, brought these people

through these three hundred miles of sand in forty years, and landed

them safe and sound."

Jack said: "There's nothin' in that three hundred miles in forty

years. Ben Halliday would have snaked 'em through in thirty-six

hours."

Well, I was speaking of Jack's innocence, and it was beautiful. Jack

was not ignorant on all subjects. That boy was a deep student in the

history of Anglo-Saxon liberty, and he was a patriot all the way

through to the marrow. There was a subject that interested him all the

time. Other subjects were of no concern to Jack, but that quaint,

inscrutable innocence of his I could not get Williams to put into

the picture.

Yes, Williams wanted to do it. He said: "I will make him as innocent

as a virgin." He thought a moment, and then said, "I will make him

as innocent as an unborn virgin," which covered the ground.

I was reminded of Jack because I came across a letter to-day which

is over thirty years old that Jack wrote. Jack was doomed to

consumption. He was very long and slim, poor creature, and in a year

or two after he got back from that excursion to the Holy Land he

went on a ride on horseback through Colorado, and he did not last

but a year or two.

He wrote this letter, not to me, but to a friend of mine, and he

said: "I have ridden horseback"- this was three years after- "I have

ridden horseback four hundred miles through a desert country where you

never see anything but cattle now and then, and now and then a

cattle station- ten miles apart, twenty miles apart. Now you tell

Clemens that in all that stretch of four hundred miles I have seen

only two books- the Bible and Innocents Abroad. Tell Clemens the Bible

was in a very good condition."

I say that he had studied, and he had, the real Saxon liberty, the

acquirement of our liberty, and Jack used to repeat some verses- I

don't know where they came from, but I thought of them to-day when I

saw that letter- that that boy could have been talking of himself in

those quoted lines from that unknown poet:

"For he had sat at Sidney's feet

And walked with him in plain apart,

And through the centuries heard the beat

Of Freedom's march through Cromwell's heart."

And he was that kind of a boy. He should have lived, and yet he

should not have lived, because he died at that early age- he

couldn't have been more than twenty- he had seen all there was to

see in the world that was worth the trouble of living in it; he had

seen all of this world that is valuable; he had seen all of this world

that was illusion, and illusion is the only valuable thing in it. He

had arrived at that point where presently the illusions would cease

and he would have entered upon the realities of life, and God help the

man that has arrived at that point.

ACCIDENT INSURANCE- ETC.

DELIVERED IN HARTFORD, AT A DINNER TO

CORNELIUS WALFORD, OF LONDON.

GENTLEMEN,- I am glad, indeed, to assist in welcoming the

distinguished guest of this occasion to a city whose fame as an

insurance centre has extended to all lands, and given us the name of

being a quadruple band of brothers working sweetly hand in hand- the

Colt's arms company making the destruction of our race easy and

convenient, our life-insurance citizens paying for the victims when

they pass away, Mr. Batterson perpetuating their memory with his

stately monuments, and our fire-insurance comrades taking care of

their hereafter. I am glad to assist in welcoming our guest- first,

because he is an Englishman, and I owe a heavy debt of hospitality

to certain of his fellow-countrymen; and secondly, because he is in

sympathy with insurance, and has been the means of making many other

men cast their sympathies in the same direction.

Certainly there is no nobler field for human effort than the

insurance line of business- especially accident insurance. Ever

since I have been a director in an accident-insurance company I have

felt that I am a better man. Life has seemed more precious.

Accidents have assumed a kindlier aspect. Distressing special

providences have lost half their horror. I look upon a cripple now

with affectionate interest- as an advertisement. I do not seem to care

for poetry any more. I do not care for politics even agriculture

does not excite me. But to me now there is a charm about a railway

collision that is unspeakable.

There is nothing more beneficent than accident insurance. I have

seen an entire family lifted out of poverty and into affluence by

the simple boon of a broken leg. I have had people come to me on

crutches, with tears in their eyes, to bless this beneficent

institution. In all my experience of life, I have seen nothing so

seraphic as the look that comes into a freshly mutilated man's face

when he feels in his vest pocket with his remaining hand and finds his

accident ticket all right. And I have seen nothing so sad as the

look that came into another splintered customer's face when he found

he couldn't collect on a wooden leg.

I will remark here, by way of advertisement, that that noble charity

which we have named the HARTFORD ACCIDENT INSURANCE COMPANY is an

The speaker was a director of the company named.

I will say, in conclusion, that my share of the welcome to our guest

is none the less hearty because I talk so much nonsense, and I know

that I can say the same for the rest of the speakers.

OSTEOPATHY

OSTEOPATHY.

On February 27, 1901, Mr. Clemens appeared before the Assembly

Committee in Albany, New York, in favor of the Seymour bill legalizing

the practice of osteopathy.

MR. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN,- Dr. Van Fleet is the gentleman who gave

me the character. I have heard my character discussed a thousand times

before you were born, sir, and shown the iniquities in it, and you did

not get more than half of them.

I was touched and distressed when they brought that part of a

child in here, and proved that you cannot take a child to pieces in

that way. What remarkable names those diseases have! It makes me

envious of the man that has them all. I have had many diseases, and am

thankful for all I have had.

One of the gentlemen spoke of the knowledge of something else

found in Sweden, a treatment which I took. It is, I suppose, a kindred

thing. There is apparently no great difference between them. I was a

year and a half in London and Sweden, in the hands of that grand old

man, Mr. Kildren.

I cannot call him a doctor, for he has not the authority to give a

certificate if a patient should die, but fortunately they don't.

The State stands as a mighty Gibraltar clothed with power. It stands

between me and my body, and tells me what kind of a doctor I must

employ. When my soul is sick unlimited spiritual liberty is given me

by the State. Now then, it doesn't seem logical that the State shall

depart from this great policy, the health of the soul, and change

about and take the other position in the matter of smaller

consequence- the health of the body.

The Bell bill limitations would drive the osteopaths out of the

State. Oh, dear me! when you drive somebody out of the State you

create the same condition as prevailed in the Garden of Eden. You want

the thing that you can't have. I didn't care much about the

osteopaths, but as soon as I found they were going to drive them out I

got in a state of uneasiness, and I can't sleep nights now.

I know how Adam felt in the Garden of Eden about the prohibited

apple. Adam didn't want the apple till he found out he couldn't have

it, just as he would have wanted osteopathy if he couldn't have it.

Whose property is my body? Probably mine. I so regard it. If I

experiment with it, who must be answerable? I, not the State. If I

choose injudiciously, does the State die? Oh no.

I was the subject of my mother's experiment. She was wise. She

made experiments cautiously. She didn't pick out just any child in the

flock. No, she chose judiciously. She chose one she could spare, and

she couldn't spare the others. I was the choice child of the flock, so

I had to take all of the experiments.

In 1844 Kneipp filled the world with the wonder of the water cure.

Mother wanted to try it, but on sober second thought she put me

through. A bucket of ice-water was poured over to see the effect. Then

I was rubbed down with flannels, a sheet was dipped in the water,

and I was put to bed. I perspired so much that mother put a

life-preserver to bed with me.

But this had nothing but a spiritual effect on me, and I didn't care

for that. When they took off the sheet it was yellow from the output

of my conscience, the exudation of sin. It purified me spiritually,

and it remains until this day.

I have experimented with osteopathy and allopathy. I took a chance

at the latter for old times' sake, for, three times, when a boy,

mother's new methods got me so near death's door she had to call in

the family physician to pull me out.

The physicians think they are moved by regard for the best interests

of the public. Isn't there a little touch of self-interest back of

it all? It seems to me there is, and I don't claim to have all the

virtues- only nine or ten of them.

I was born in the "Banner State," and by "Banner State" I mean

Missouri. Osteopathy was born in the same State, and both of us are

getting along reasonably well. At a time during my younger days my

attention was attracted to a picture of a house which bore the

inscription, "Christ Disputing with the Doctors."

I could attach no other meaning to it than that Christ was

actually quarrelling with the doctors. So I asked an old slave, who

was a sort of a herb doctor in a small way- unlicensed, of course-

what the meaning of the picture was. "What has he done?" I asked.

And the colored man replied:

"Humph, he ain't got no license."

WATER-SUPPLY.

Mr. Clemens visited Albany on February 27 and 28, 1901. The

privileges of the floor were granted to him, and he was asked to

make a short address to the Senate.

MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN,- I do not know how to thank you

sufficiently for this high honor which you are conferring upon me. I

have for the second time now enjoyed this kind of prodigal

hospitality- in the other House yesterday, to-day in this one. I am

a modest man, and diffident about appearing before legislative bodies,

and yet utterly and entirely appreciative of a courtesy like this when

it is extended to me, and I thank you very much for it.

If I had the privilege, which unfortunately I have not got, of

suggesting things to the legislators in my individual capacity, I

would so enjoy the opportunity that I would not charge anything for it

at all. I would do that without a salary. I would give them the

benefit of my wisdom and experience in legislative bodies, and if I

could have had the privilege for a few minutes of giving advice to the

other House I should have liked to, but of course I could not

undertake it, as they did not ask me to do it- but if they had only

asked me!

Now that the House is considering a measure which is to furnish a

water-supply to the city of New York, why, permit me to say I live

in New York myself. I know all about its ways, its desires, and its

residents, and- if I had the privilege- I should have urged them not

to weary themselves over a measure like that to furnish water to the

city of New York, for we never drink it.

But I will not venture to advise this body, as I only venture to

advise bodies who are not present.

MISTAKEN IDENTITY.

ADDRESS AT THE ANNUAL "LADIES' DAY,"

PAPYRUS CLUB, BOSTON.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,- I am perfectly astonished-

a-s-t-o-n-i-s-h-e-d- ladies and gentlemen- astonished at the way

history repeats itself. I find myself situated at this moment

exactly and precisely as I was once before, years ago, to a jot, to

a tittle- to a very hair. There isn't a shade of difference. It is the

most astonishing coincidence that ever- but wait. I will tell you

the former instance, and then you will see it for yourself. Years

ago I arrived one day at Salamanca, New York, eastward bound; must

change cars there and take the sleeper train. There were crowds of

people there, and they were swarming into the long sleeper train and

packing it full, and it was a perfect purgatory of dust and

confusion and gritting of teeth and soft, sweet, and low profanity.

I asked the young man in the ticket-office if I could have a

sleeping-section, and he answered "No," with a snarl that shrivelled

me up like burned leather. I went off, smarting under this insult to

my dignity, and asked another local official, supplicatingly, if I

couldn't have some poor little corner somewhere in a sleeping-car; but

he cut me short with a venomous "No, you can't; every corner is

full. Now, don't bother me any more"; and he turned his back and

walked off. My dignity was in a state now which cannot be described. I

was so ruffled that- well, I said to my companion, "If these people

knew who I am they-" But my companion cut me short there- "Don't

talk such folly," he said; "if they did know who you are, do you

suppose it would help your high-mightiness to a vacancy in a train

which has no vacancies in it?"

This did not improve my condition any to speak of, but just then I

observed that the colored porter of a sleeping-car had his eye on

me. I saw his dark countenance light up. He whispered to the uniformed

conductor, punctuating with nods and jerks toward me, and

straightway this conductor came forward, oozing politeness from

every pore.

"Can I be of any service to you?" he asked. "Will you have a place

in the sleeper?"

"Yes," I said, "and much oblige me, too. Give me anything-

anything will answer."

"We have nothing left but the big family stateroom," he continued,

"with two berths and a couple of arm-chairs in it, but it is

entirely at your disposal. Here, Tom, take these satchels aboard!"

Then he touched his hat and we and the colored Tom moved along. I

was bursting to drop just one little remark to my companion, but I

held in and waited. Tom made us comfortable in that sumptuous great

apartment, and then said, with many bows and a perfect affluence of

smiles:

"Now, is dey anything you want, sah? Case you kin have jes' anything

you wants. It don't make no difference what it is."

"Can I have some hot water and a tumbler at nine to-night- blazing

hot?" I asked. "You know about the right temperature for a hot

Scotch punch?"

"Yes, sah, dat you kin; you kin pen on it; I'll get it myself."

"Good! Now, that lamp is hung too high. Can I have a big coach

candle fixed up just at the head of my bed, so that I can read

comfortably?"

"Yes, sah, you kin; I'll fix her up myself, an' I'll fix her so

she'll burn all night. Yes, sah; an' you can jes' call for anything

you want, and dish yer whole railroad 'll be turned wrong end up an'

inside out for to get it for you. Dat's so." And he disappeared.

Well, I tilted my head back, hooked my thumbs in my armholes, smiled

a smile on my companion, and said, gently:

"Well, what do you say now?"

My companion was not in the humor to respond, and didn't. The next

moment that smiling black face was thrust in at the crack of the door,

and this speech followed:

"Laws bless you, sah, I knowed you in a minute. I told de

conductah so. Laws! I knowed you de minute I sot eyes on you."

"Is that so, my boy?" (Handing him a quadruple fee.) "Who am I?"

"Jenuel McClellan," and he disappeared again.

My companion said, vinegarishly, "Well, well! what do you say

now?" Right there comes in the marvellous coincidence I mentioned a

while ago- viz., I was speechless, and that is my condition now.

Perceive it?

CATS AND CANDY.

The following address was delivered at a social meeting of

literary men in New York in 1874:

WHEN I was fourteen I was living with my parents, who were very

poor- and correspondently honest. We had a youth living with us by the

name of Jim Wolfe. He was an excellent fellow, seventeen years old,

and very diffident. He and I slept together- virtuously; and one

bitter winter's night a cousin Mary- she's married now and gone-

gave what they call a candy-pulling in those days in the West, and

they took the saucers of hot candy outside of the house into the snow,

under a sort of old bower that came from the eaves- it was a sort of

an ell then, all covered with vines- to cool this hot candy in the

snow, and they were all sitting there. In the mean time we were gone

to bed. We were not invited to attend this party; we were too young.

The young ladies and gentlemen were assembled there, and Jim and I

were in bed. There was about four inches of snow on the roof of this

ell, and our windows looked out on it, and it was frozen hard. A

couple of tom-cats- it is possible one might have been of the opposite

sex- were assembled on the chimney in the middle of this ell, and they

were growling at a fearful rate, and switching their tails about and

going on, and we couldn't sleep at all.

Finally Jim said, "For two cents I'd go out and snake them cats

off that chimney." So I said, "Of course you would." He said, "Well, I

would; I have a mighty good notion to do it." Says I, "Of course you

have; certainly you have, you have a great notion to do it." I hoped

he might try it, but I was afraid he wouldn't.

Finally I did get his ambition up, and he raised the window and

climbed out on the icy roof, with nothing on but his socks and a

very short shirt. He went climbing along on all fours on the roof

toward the chimney where the cats were. In the mean time these young

ladies and gentlemen were enjoying themselves down under the eaves,

and when Jim got almost to that chimney he made a pass at the cats,

and his heels flew up and he shot down and crashed through those

vines, and lit in the midst of the ladies and gentlemen, and sat

down in those hot saucers of candy.

There was a stampede, of course, and he came up-stairs dropping

pieces of chinaware and candy all the way up, and when he got up

there- now anybody in the world would have gone into profanity or

something calculated to relieve the mind, but he didn't; he scraped

the candy off his legs, nursed his blisters a little, and said, "I

could have ketched them cats if I had had on a good ready."

OBITUARY POETRY.

ADDRESS AT THE ACTORS' FUND FAIR,

PHILADELPHIA, in 1895.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,- The- er- this- er- welcome occasion gives

me an- er- opportunity to make an- er- explanation that I have long

desired to deliver myself of. I rise to the highest honors before a

Philadelphia audience. In the course of my checkered career I have, on

divers occasions, been charged- er- maliciously with a more or less

serious offence. It is in reply to one of the more- er- important of

these that I wish to speak. More than once I have been accused of

writing obituary poetry in the Philadelphia Ledger.

I wish right here to deny that dreadful assertion. I will admit that

once, when a compositor in the Ledger establishment, I did set up some

of that poetry, but for a worse offence than that no indictment can be

found against me. I did not write that poetry- at least, not all of

it.

CIGARS AND TOBACCO.

MY friends for some years now have remarked that I am an

inveterate consumer of tobacco. That is true, but my habits with

regard to tobacco have changed. I have no doubt that you will say,

when I have explained to you what my present purpose is, that my taste

has deteriorated, but I do not so regard it.

Whenever I held a smoking-party at my house, I found that my

guests had always just taken the pledge.

Let me tell you briefly the history of my personal relation to

tobacco. It began, I think, when I was a lad, and took the form of a

quid, which I became expert in tucking under my tongue. Afterward I

learned the delights of the pipe, and I suppose there was no other

youngster of my age who could more deftly cut plug tobacco so as to

make it available for pipe-smoking.

Well, time ran on, and there came a time when I was able to

gratify one of my youthful ambitions- I could buy the choicest

Havana cigars without seriously interfering with my income. I smoked a

good many, changing off from the Havana cigars to the pipe in the

course of a day's smoking.

At last it occurred to me that something was lacking in the Havana

cigar. It did not quite fulfil my youthful anticipations. I

experimented. I bought what was called a seed-leaf cigar with a

Connecticut wrapper. After a while I became satiated of these, and I

searched for something else. The Pittsburg stogy was recommended to

me. It certainly had the merit of cheapness, if that be a merit in

tobacco, and I experimented with the stogy.

Then, once more, I changed off, so that I might acquire the

subtler flavor of the Wheeling toby. Now that palled, and I looked

around New York in the hope of finding cigars which would seem to most

people vile, but which, I am sure, would be ambrosial to me. I

couldn't find any. They put into my hands some of those little

things that cost ten cents a box, but they are a delusion.

I said to a friend, "I want to know if you can direct me to an

honest tobacco merchant who will tell me what is the worst cigar in

the New York market, excepting those made for Chinese consumption- I

want real tobacco. If you will do this and I find the man is as good

as his word, I will guarantee him a regular market for a fair amount

of his cigars."

We found a tobacco dealer who would tell the truth- who, if a

cigar was bad, would boldly say so. He produced what he called the

very worst cigars he had ever had in his shop. He let me experiment

with one then and there. The test was satisfactory.

This was, after all, the real thing. I negotiated for a box of

them and took them away with me, so that I might be sure of having

them handy when I want them.

I discovered that the "worst cigars," so called, are the best for me

after all.

BILLIARDS

BILLIARDS.

Mr. Clemens attended a billiard tourney on the evening of April

24, 1906, and was called on to tell a story.

THE game of billiards has destroyed my naturally sweet

disposition. Once, when I was an underpaid reporter in Virginia

City, whenever I wished to play billiards I went out to look for an

easy mark. One day a stranger came to town and opened a billiard

parlor. I looked him over casually. When he proposed a game, I

answered, "All right."

"Just knock the balls around a little so that I can get your

gait," he said; and when I had done so, he remarked: "I will be

perfectly fair with you. I'll play you left-handed." I felt hurt,

for he was cross-eyed, freckled, and had red hair, and I determined to

teach him a lesson. He won first shot, ran out, took my half-dollar,

and all I got was the opportunity to chalk my cue.

"If you can play like that with your left hand," I said, "I'd like

to see you play with your right."

"I can't, he said. "I'm left-handed."

THE UNION RIGHT OR WRONG?

REMINISCENCES OF NEVADA.

I CAN assure you, ladies and gentlemen, that Nevada had lively

newspapers in those days.

My great competitor among the reporters was Boggs, of the Union,

an excellent reporter.

Once in three or four months he would get a little intoxicated; but,

as a general thing, he was a wary and cautious drinker, although

always ready to damp himself a little with the enemy.

He had the advantage of me in one thing: he could get the monthly

public-school report and I could not, because the principal hated my

sheet- the Enterprise.

One snowy night, when the report was due, I started out, sadly

wondering how I was to get it.

Presently, a few steps up the almost deserted street, I stumbled

on Boggs, and asked him where he was going.

"After the school report."

"I'll go along with you."

"No, sir. I'll excuse you."

"Have it your own way."

A saloon-keeper's boy passed by with a steaming pitcher of hot

punch, and Boggs snuffed the fragrance gratefully.

He gazed fondly after the boy, and saw him start up the Enterprise

stairs.

I said:

"I wish you could help me get that school business, but since you

can't, I must run up to the Union office and see if I can get a

proof of it after it's set up, though I don't begin to suppose I

can. Good night."

"Hold on a minute. I don't mind getting the report and sitting

around with the boys a little while you copy it, if you're willing

to drop down to the principal's with me."

"Now you talk like a human being. Come along."

We ploughed a couple of blocks through the snow, got the report- a

short document- and soon copied it in our office.

Meantime, Boggs helped himself to the punch.

I gave the manuscript back to him, and we started back to get an

inquest.

At four o'clock in the morning, when we had gone to press and were

having a relaxing concert as usual (for some of the printers were good

singers and others good performers on the guitar and on that

atrocity the accordion), the proprietor of the Union strode in and

asked if anybody had heard anything of Boggs or the school report.

We stated the case, and all turned out to help hunt for the

delinquent.

We found him standing on a table in a saloon, with an old tin

lantern in one hand and the school report in the other, haranguing a

gang of "corned" miners on the iniquity of squandering the public

money on education "when hundreds and hundreds of honest, hard-working

men were literally starving for whiskey."

He had been assisting in a regal spree with those parties for hours.

We dragged him away, and put him into bed.

Of course there was no school report in the Union, and Boggs held me

accountable, though I was innocent of any intention or desire to

compass its absence from that paper, and was as sorry as any one

that the misfortune had occurred. But we were perfectly friendly.

The day the next school report was due the proprietor of the

Tennessee Mine furnished us a buggy, and asked us to go down and write

something about the property- a very common request, and one always

gladly acceded to when people furnished buggies, for we were as fond

of pleasure excursions as other people.

The "mine" was a hole in the ground ninety feet deep, and no way

of getting down into it but by holding on to a rope and being

lowered with a windlass.

The workmen had just gone off somewhere to dinner.

I was not strong enough to lower Boggs's bulk, so I took an

unlighted candle in my teeth, made a loop for my foot in the end of

the rope, implored Boggs not to go to sleep or let the windlass get

the start of him, and then swung out over the shaft.

I reached the bottom muddy and bruised about the elbows, but safe.

I lit the candle, made an examination of the rock, selected some

specimens, and shouted to Boggs to hoist away.

No answer.

Presently a head appeared in the circle of daylight away aloft,

and a voice came down:

"Are you all set?"

"All set- hoist away!"

"Are you comfortable?"

"Perfectly."

"Could you wait a little?"

"Oh, certainly- no particular hurry."

"Well- good-bye."

"Why, where are you going?"

"After the school report!"

And he did.

I stayed down there an hour, and surprised the workmen when they

hauled up and found a man on the rope instead of a bucket of rock.

I walked home, too- five miles- up-hill.

We had no school report next morning- but the Union had.

AN IDEAL FRENCH ADDRESS.

EXTRACT FROM "PARIS NOTES," IN "TOM SAWYER

ABROAD," ETC.

I AM told that a French sermon is like a French speech- it never

names an historical event, but only the date of it; if you are not

up in dates, you get left. A French speech is something like this:

"Comrades, citizens, brothers, noble parts of the only sublime and

perfect nation, let us not forget that the 21st January cast off our

chains; that the 10th August relieved us of the shameful presence of

foreign spies; that the 5th September was its own justification before

heaven and humanity; that the 18th Brumaire contained the seeds of its

own punishment; that the 14th July was the mighty voice of liberty

proclaiming the resurrection, the new day, and inviting the

oppressed peoples of the earth to look upon the divine face of

France and live; and let us here record our everlasting curse

against the man of the 2d December, and declare in thunder tones,

the native tones of France, that but for him there had been no 17th

March in history, no 12th October, no 19th January, no 22d April, no

16th November, no 30th September, no 2d July, no 14th February, no

29th June, no 15th August, no 31st May- that but for him, France,

the pure, the grand, the peerless, had had a serene and vacant almanac

to-day."

I have heard of one French sermon which closed in this odd yet

eloquent way:

"My hearers, we have sad cause to remember the man of the 13th

January. The results of the vast crime of the 13th January have been

in just proportion to the magnitude of the act itself. But for it

there had been no 30th November- sorrowful spectacle! The grisly

deed of the 16th June had not been done but for it, nor had the man of

the 16th June known existence; to it alone the 3d September was due,

also the fatal 12th October. Shall we, then, be grateful for the

13th January, with its freight of death for you and me and all that

breathe? Yes, my friends, for it gave us also that which had never

come but for it, and it alone- the blessed 25th December."

It may be well enough to explain. The man of the 13th January is

Adam; the crime of that date was the eating of the apple; the

sorrowful spectacle of the 30th November was the expulsion from

Eden; the grisly deed of the 16th June was the murder of Abel; the act

of the 3d September was the beginning of the journey to the land of

Nod; the 12th day of October, the last mountaintops disappeared

under the flood. When you go to church in France, you want to take

your almanac with you- annotated.

STATISTICS

STATISTICS.

EXTRACT FROM "THE HISTORY OF THE SAVAGE CLUB."

During that period of gloom when domestic bereavement had forced Mr.

Clemens and his dear ones to secure the privacy they craved until

their wounds should heal, his address was known to only a very few

of his closest friends. One old friend in New York, after vain efforts

to get his address, wrote him a letter addressed as follows:

MARK TWAIN,

God Knows Where,

Try London.

The letter found him, and Mr. Clemens replied to the letter

expressing himself surprised and complimented that the person who

was credited with knowing his whereabouts should take so much interest

in him, adding: "Had the letter been addressed to the care of the

'other party,' I would naturally have expected to receive it without

delay."

His correspondent tried again, and addressed the second letter:

MARK TWAIN,

The Devil Knows Where,

Try London.

This found him also no less promptly.

On June 9, 1899, he consented to visit the Savage Club, London, on

condition that there was to be no publicity and no speech was to be

expected from him. The toastmaster, in proposing the health of their

guest, said that as a Scotchman, and therefore as a born expert, he

thought Mark Twain had little or no claim to the title of humorist.

Mr. Clemens had tried to be funny but had failed, and his true role in

life was statistics; that he was a master of statistics, and loved

them for their own sake, and it would be the easiest task he ever

undertook if he would try to count all the real jokes he had ever

made. While the toastmaster was speaking, the members saw Mr.

Clemens's eyes begin to sparkle and his cheeks to flush. He jumped up,

and made a characteristic speech.

PERHAPS I am not a. humorist, but I am a first-class fool- a

simpleton; for up to this moment I have believed Chairman MacAlister

to be a decent person whom I could allow to mix up with my friends and

relatives. The exhibition he has just made of himself reveals him to

be a scoundrel and a knave of the deepest dye. I have been cruelly

deceived, and it serves me right for trusting a Scotchman. Yes, I do

understand figures, and I can count. I have counted the words in

MacAlister's drivel (I certainly cannot call it a speech), and there

were exactly three thousand four hundred and thirty-nine. I also

carefully counted the lies- there were exactly three thousand four

hundred and thirty-nine. Therefore, I leave MacAlister to his fate.

I was sorry to have my name mentioned as one of the great authors,

because they have a sad habit of dying off. Chaucer is dead, Spencer

is dead, so is Milton, so is Shakespeare, and I am not feeling very

well myself.

GALVESTON ORPHAN BAZAAR.

ADDRESS AT A FAIR HELD AT THE WALDORF-ASTORIA,

NEW YORK, IN OCTOBER, 1900, IN AID OF

THE ORPHANS AT GALVESTON.

I EXPECTED that the Governor of Texas would occupy this place

first and would speak to you, and in the course of his remarks would

drop a text for me to talk from; but with the proverbial obstinacy

that is proverbial with governors, they go back on their duties, and

he has not come here, and has not furnished me with a text, and I am

here without a text. I have no text except what you furnish me with

your handsome faces, and- but I won't continue that, for I could go on

forever about attractive faces, beautiful dresses, and other things.

But, after all, compliments should be in order in a place like this.

I have been in New York two or three days, and have been in a

condition of strict diligence night and day, the object of this

diligence being to regulate the moral and political situation on

this planet- put it on a sound basis- and when you are regulating

the conditions of a planet it requires a great deal of talk in a great

many kinds of ways, and when you have talked a lot the emptier you

get, and get also in a position of corking. When I am situated like

that, with nothing to say, I feel as though I were a sort of fraud;

I seem to be playing a part, and please consider I am playing a part

for want of something better, and this is not unfamiliar to me; I have

often done this before.

When I was here about eight years ago I was coming up in a car of

the elevated road. Very few people were in that car, and on one end of

it there was no one, except on the opposite seat, where sat a man

about fifty years old, with a most winning face and an elegant eye-

a beautiful eye; and I took him from his dress to be a master

mechanic, a man who had a vocation. He had with him a very fine little

child of about four or five years. I was watching the affection

which existed between those two. I judged he was the grandfather,

perhaps. It was really a pretty child, and I was admiring her, and

as soon as he saw I was admiring her he began to notice me.

I could see his admiration of me in his eye, and I did what

everybody else would do- admired the child four times as much, knowing

I would get four times as much of his admiration. Things went on

very pleasantly. I was making my way into his heart.

By-and-by, when he almost reached the station where he was to get

off, he got up, crossed over, and he said: "Now I am going to say

something to you which I hope you will regard as a compliment." And

then he went on to say: "I have never seen Mark Twain, but I have seen

a portrait of him, and any friend of mine will tell you that when I

have once seen a portrait of a man I place it in my eye and store it

away in my memory, and I can tell you now that you look enough like

Mark Twain to be his brother. Now," he said, "I hope you take this

as a compliment. Yes, you are a very good imitation; but when I come

to look closer, you are probably not that man."

I said: "I will be frank with you. In my desire to look like that

excellent character I have dressed for the character; I have been

playing a part."

He said: "That is all right, that is all right; you look very well

on the outside, but when it comes to the inside you are not in it with

the original."

So when I come to a place like this with nothing valuable to say I

always play a part. But I will say before I sit down that when it

comes to saying anything here I will express myself in this way: I

am heartily in sympathy with you in your efforts to help those who

were sufferers in this calamity, and in your desire to help those

who were rendered homeless, and in saying this I wish to impress on

you the fact that I am not playing a part.

SAN FRANCISCO EARTHQUAKE.

After the address at the Robert Fulton Fund meeting, June 19,

1906, Mr. Clemens talked to the assembled reporters about the San

Francisco earthquake.

I HAVEN'T been there since 1868, and that great city of San

Francisco has grown up since my day. When I was there she had one

hundred and eighteen thousand people, and of this number eighteen

thousand were Chinese. I was a reporter on the Virginia City

Enterprise in Nevada in 1862, and stayed there, I think, about two

years, when I went to San Francisco and got a job as a reporter on The

Call. I was there three or four years.

I remember one day I was walking down Third Street in San Francisco.

It was a sleepy, dull Sunday afternoon, and no one was stirring.

Suddenly as I looked up the street about three hundred yards the whole

side of a house fell out. The street was full of bricks and mortar. At

the same time I was knocked against the side of a house, and stood

there stunned for a moment.

I thought it was an earthquake. Nobody else had heard anything about

it and no one said earthquake to me afterward, but I saw it and I

wrote it. Nobody else wrote it, and the house I saw go into the street

was the only house in the city that felt it. I've always wondered if

it wasn't a little performance gotten up for my especial entertainment

by the nether regions.

CHARITY AND ACTORS.

ADDRESS AT THE ACTORS' FUND FAIR IN THE METROPOLITAN

OPERA HOUSE, NEW YORK, MAY 6, 1907.

Mr. Clemens, in his white suit, formally declared the fair open. Mr.

Daniel Frohman, in introducing Mr. Clemens, said:

"We intend to make this a banner week in the history of the Fund,

which takes an interest in every one on the stage, be he actor,

singer, dancer, or workman. We have spent more than $40,000 during the

past year. Charity covers a multitude of sins, but it also reveals a

multitude of virtues. At the opening of the former fair we had the

assistance of Edwin Booth and Joseph Jefferson. In their place we have

to-day that American institution and apostle of wide humanity- Mark

Twain."

AS Mr. Frohman has said, charity reveals a multitude of virtues.

This is true, and it is to be proved here before the week is over. Mr.

Frohman has told you something of the object and something of the

character of the work. He told me he would do this- and he has kept

his word! I had expected to hear of it through the newspapers. I

wouldn't trust anything between Frohman and the newspapers- except

when it's a case of charity!

You should all remember that the actor has been your benefactor many

and many a year. When you have been weary and downcast he has lifted

your heart out of gloom and given you a fresh impulse. You are all

under obligation to him. This is your opportunity to be his

benefactor- to help provide for him in his old age and when he suffers

from infirmities.

At this fair no one is to be persecuted to buy. If you offer a

twenty-dollar bill in payment for a purchase of $1 you will receive

$19 in change. There is to be no robbery here. There is to be no creed

here- no religion except charity. We want to raise $250,000- and

that is a great task to attempt.

The President has set the fair in motion by pressing the button in

Washington. Now your good wishes are to be transmuted into cash.

By virtue of the authority in me vested I declare the fair open. I

call the ball game. Let the transmuting begin!

RUSSIAN REPUBLIC.

The American auxiliary movement to aid the cause of freedom in

Russia was launched on the evening of April 11, 1906, at the Club A

house, 3 Fifth Avenue, with Mr. Clemens and Maxim Gorky as the

principal spokesmen. Mr. Clemens made an introductory address,

presenting Mr. Gorky.

IF we can build a Russian republic to give to the persecuted

people of the Tsar's domain the same measure of freedom that we enjoy,

let us go ahead and do it. We need not discuss the methods by which

that purpose is to be attained. Let us hope that fighting will be

postponed or averted for a while, but if it must come-

I am most emphatically in sympathy with the movement, now on foot in

Russia, to make that country free. I am certain that it will be

successful, as it deserves to be. Any such movement should have and

deserves our earnest and unanimous co-operation, and such a petition

for funds as has been explained by Mr. Hunter, with its just and

powerful meaning, should have the utmost support of each and every one

of us. Anybody whose ancestors were in this country when we were

trying to free ourselves from oppression, must sympathize with those

who now are trying to do the same thing in Russia.

The parallel I have just drawn only goes to show that it makes no

difference whether the oppression is bitter or not; men with red, warm

blood in their veins will not endure it, but will seek to cast it off.

If we keep our hearts in this matter Russia will be free.

RUSSIAN SUFFERERS.

On December 18, 1905, an entertainment was given at the Casino for

the benefit of the Russian sufferers. After the performance Mr.

Clemens spoke.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,- It seems a sort of cruelty to inflict upon an

audience like this our rude English tongue, after we have heard that

divine speech flowing in that lucid Gallic tongue.

It has always been a marvel to me- that French language; it has

always been a puzzle to me. How beautiful that language is. How

expressive it seems to be. How full of grace it is.

And when it comes from lips like those, how eloquent and how

liquid it is. And, oh, I am always deceived- I always think I am going

to understand it.

Oh, it is such a delight to me, such a delight to me, to meet Madame

Bernhardt, and laugh hand to hand and heart to heart with her.

I have seen her play, as we all have, and oh, that is divine; but

I have always wanted to know Madame Bernhardt herself- her fiery self.

I have wanted to know that beautiful character.

Why, she is the youngest person I ever saw, except myself- for I

always feel young when I come in the presence of young people.

I have a pleasant recollection of an incident so many years ago-

when Madame Bernhardt came to Hartford, where I lived, and she was

going to play and the tickets were three dollars, and there were two

lovely women- a widow and her daughter- neighbors of ours, highly

cultivated ladies they were; their tastes were fine and elevated,

but they were very poor, and they said: "Well, we must not spend six

dollars on a pleasure of the mind, a pleasure of the intellect; we

must spend it, if it must go at all, to furnish to somebody bread to

eat."

And so they sorrowed over the fact that they had to give up that

great pleasure of seeing Madame Bernhardt, but there were two

neighbors equally highly cultivated and who could not afford bread,

and those good-hearted Joneses sent that six dollars- deprived

themselves of it- and sent it to those poor Smiths to buy bread

with. And those Smiths took it and bought tickets with it to see

Madame Bernhardt.

Oh yes, some people have tastes and intelligence also.

Now, I was going to make a speech- I supposed I was, but I am not.

It is late, late; and so I am going to tell a story; and there is this

advantage about a story, anyway, that whatever moral or valuable thing

you put into a speech, why, it gets diffused among those involuted

sentences and possibly your audience goes away without finding out

what that valuable thing was that you were trying to confer upon it;

but, dear me, you put the same jewel into a story and it becomes the

keystone of that story, and you are bound to get it- it flashes, it

flames, it is the jewel in the toad's head- you don't overlook that.

Now, if I am going to talk on such a subject as, for instance, the

lost opportunity- oh, the lost opportunity. Anybody in this house

who has reached the turn of life- sixty or seventy, or even fifty,

or along there- when he goes back along his history, there he finds it

mile-stoned all the way with the lost opportunity, and you know how

pathetic that is.

You younger ones cannot know the full pathos that lies in those

words- the lost opportunity; but anybody who is old, who has really

lived and felt this life, he knows the pathos of the lost opportunity.

Now, I will tell you a story whose moral is that, whose lesson is

that, whose lament is that.

I was in a village which is a suburb of New Bedford several years

ago- well, New Bedford is a suburb of Fair Haven, or perhaps it is the

other way; in any case, it took both of those towns to make a great

centre of the great whaling industry of the first half of the

nineteenth century, and I was up there at Fair Haven some years ago

with a friend of mine.

There was a dedication of a great town-hall, a public building,

and we were there in the afternoon. This great building was filled,

like this great theatre, with rejoicing villagers, and my friend and I

started down the centre aisle. He saw a man standing in that aisle,

and he said:

"Now, look at that bronzed veteran- at that mahogany-faced man. Now,

tell me, do you see anything about that man's face that is

emotional? Do you see anything about it that suggests that inside that

man anywhere there are fires that can be started? Would you ever

imagine that that is a human volcano?"

"Why, no," I said, "I would not. He looks like a wooden Indian in

front of a cigar store."

"Very well," said my friend, "I will show you that there is

emotion even in that unpromising place. I will just go to that man and

I will just mention in the most casual way an incident in his life.

That man is getting along toward ninety years old. He is past

eighty. I will mention an incident of fifty or sixty years ago. Now,

just watch the effect, and it will be so casual that if you don't

watch you won't know when I do say that thing- but you just watch

the effect."

He went on down there and accosted this antiquity, and made a remark

or two. I could not catch up. They were so casual I could not

recognize which one it was that touched that bottom, for in an instant

that old man was literally in eruption and was filling the whole place

with profanity of the most exquisite kind. You never heard such

accomplished profanity. I never heard it also delivered with such

eloquence.

I never enjoyed profanity as I enjoyed it then- more than if I had

been uttering it myself. There is nothing like listening to an artist-

all his passions passing away in lava, smoke, thunder, lightning,

and earthquake.

Then this friend said to me: "Now, I will tell you about that. About

sixty years ago that man was a young fellow of twenty-three, and had

just come home from a three years' whaling voyage. He came into that

village of his, happy and proud because now, instead of being chief

mate, he was going to be master of a whaleship, and he was proud and

happy about it.

"Then he found that there had been a kind of a cold frost come

upon that town and the whole region roundabout; for while he had

been away the Father Mathew temperance excitement had come upon the

whole region. Therefore, everybody had taken the pledge; there

wasn't anybody for miles and miles around that had not taken the

pledge.

"So you can see what a solitude it was to this young man, who was

fond of his grog. And he was just an outcast, because when they

found he would not join Father Mathew's Society they ostracized him,

and he went about that town three weeks, day and night, in utter

loneliness- the only human being in the whole place who ever took

grog, and he had to take it privately.

"If you don't know what it is to be ostracized, to be shunned by

your fellow-man, may you never know it. Then he recognized that

there was something more valuable in this life than grog, and that

is the fellowship of your fellow-man. And at last he gave it up, and

at nine o'clock one night he went down to the Father Mathew Temperance

Society, and with a broken heart he said: 'Put my name down for

membership in this society.'

"And then he went away crying, and at earliest dawn the next morning

they came for him and routed him out, and they said that new ship of

his was ready to sail on a three years' voyage. In a minute he was

on board that ship and gone.

"And he said- well, he was not out of sight of that town till he

began to repent, but he had made up his mind that he would not take

a drink, and so that whole voyage of three years was a three years'

agony to that man because he saw all the time the mistake he had made.

"He felt it all through; he had constant reminders of it, because

the crew would pass him with their grog, come out on the deck and take

it, and there was the torturous smell of it.

"He went through the whole three years of suffering, and at last

coming into port it was snowy, it was cold, he was stamping through

the snow two feet deep on the deck and longing to get home, and

there was his crew torturing him to the last minute with hot grog, but

at last he had his reward. He really did get to shore at last, and

jumped and ran and bought a jug and rushed to the society's office,

and said to the secretary:

"'Take my name off your membership books, and do it right away! I

have got a three years' thirst on.'

"And the secretary said: 'It is not necessary. You were

blackballed!'"

WATTERSON AND TWAIN AS REBELS.

ADDRESS AT THE CELEBRATION OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S 92D

BIRTHDAY ANNIVERSARY, CARNEGIE HALL, FEBRUARY 11,

1901, TO RAISE FUNDS FOR THE LINCOLN MEMORIAL

UNIVERSITY AT CUMBERLAND GAP, TENN.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,- The remainder of my duties as presiding

chairman here this evening are but two- only two. One of them is easy,

and the other difficult. That is to say, I must introduce the

orator, and then keep still and give him a chance. The name of Henry

Watterson carries with it its own explanation. It is like an

electric light on top of Madison Square Garden; you touch the button

and the light flashes up out of the darkness. You mention the name

of Henry Watterson, and your minds are at once illuminated with the

splendid radiance of his fame and achievements. A journalist, a

soldier, an orator, a statesman, a rebel. Yes, he was a rebel; and,

better still, now he is a reconstructed rebel.

It is a curious circumstance, a circumstance brought about without

any collusion or prearrangement, that he and I, both of whom were

rebels related by blood to each other, should be brought here together

this evening bearing a tribute in our hands and bowing our heads in

reverence to that noble soul who for three years we tried to

destroy. I don't know as the fact has ever been mentioned before,

but it is a fact, nevertheless. Colonel Watterson and I were both

rebels, and we are blood relations. I was a second lieutenant in a

Confederate company- for a while- oh, I could have stayed on if I

had wanted to. I made myself felt, I left tracks all around the

country. I could have stayed on, but it was such weather. I never

saw such weather to be out-of-doors in, in all my life.

The Colonel commanded a regiment, and did his part, I suppose, to

destroy the Union. He did not succeed, yet if he had obeyed me he

would have done so. I had a plan, and I fully intended to drive

General Grant into the Pacific Ocean- if I could get transportation. I

told Colonel Watterson about it. I told him what he had to do. What

I wanted him to do was to surround the Eastern army and wait until I

came up. But he was insubordinate; he stuck on some quibble of

military etiquette about a second lieutenant giving orders to a

colonel or something like that. And what was the consequence? The

Union was preserved. This is the first time I believe that that secret

has ever been revealed.

No one outside of the family circle, I think, knew it before; but

there the facts are. Watterson saved the Union; yes, he saved the

Union. And yet there he sits, and not a step has been taken or a

movement made toward granting him a pension. That is the way things

are done. It is a case where some blushing ought to be done. You ought

to blush, and I ought to blush, and he- well, he's a little out of

practice now.

ROBERT FULTON FUND.

ADDRESS MADE ON THE EVENING OF APRIL 19, 1906.

Mr. Clemens had been asked to address the association by Gen.

Frederick D. Grant, president. He was offered a fee of $1000, but

refused it, saying:

"I shall be glad to do it, but I must stipulate that you keep the

$1000, and add it to the Memorial Fund as my contribution to erect a

monument in New York to the memory of the man who applied steam to

navigation."

At this meeting Mr. Clemens made this formal announcement from the

platform:

"This is my last appearance on the paid platform. I shall not retire

from the gratis platform until I am buried, and courtesy will compel

me to keep still and not disturb the others. Now, since I must, I

shall say good-bye. I see many faces in this audience well known to

me. They are all my friends, and I feel that those I don't know are my

friends, too. I wish to consider that you represent the nation, and

that in saying good-bye to you I am saying good-bye to the nation.

In the great name of humanity, let me say this final word: I offer

an appeal in behalf of that vast, pathetic multitude of fathers,

mothers, and helpless little children. They were sheltered and happy

two days ago. Now they are wandering, forlorn, hopeless, and homeless,

the victims of a great disaster. So I beg of you, I beg of you, to

open your hearts and open your purses and remember San Francisco,

the smitten city."

I WISH to deliver a historical address. I've been studying the

history of- er- a- let me see- a [then he stopped in confusion, and

walked over to Gen. Fred D. Grant, who sat at the head of the

platform. He leaned over in a whisper, and then returned to the

front of the stage and continued]. Oh yes! I've been studying Robert

Fulton. I've been studying a biographical sketch of Robert Fulton, the

inventor of- er- a- let's see- oh yes, the inventor of the electric

telegraph and the Morse sewing-machine. Also, I understand he invented

the air- diria- pshaw! I have it at last- the dirigible balloon.

Yes, the dirigible but it is a difficult word, and I don't see why

anybody should marry a couple of words like that when they don't

want to be married at all and are likely to quarrel with each other

all the time. I should put that couple of words under the ban of the

United States Supreme Court, under its decision of a few days ago, and

take 'em out and drown 'em.

I used to know Fulton. It used to do me good to see him dashing

through the town on a wild broncho.

And Fulton was born in er- a- well, it doesn't make much

difference where he was born, does it? I remember a man who came to

interview me once, to get a sketch of my life. I consulted with a

friend- a practical man- before he came, to know how I should treat

him.

"Whenever you give the interviewer a fact," he said, "give him

another fact that will contradict it. Then he'll go away with a jumble

that he can't use at all. Be gentle, be sweet, smile like an idiot-

just be natural." That's what my friend told me to do, and I did it.

"Where were you born?" asked the interviewer.

"Well- er- a," I began, "I was born in Alabama, or Alaska, or the

Sandwich Islands; I don't know where, but right around there

somewhere. And you had better put it down before you forget it."

"But you weren't born in all those places," he said.

"Well, I've offered you three places. Take your choice. They're

all at the same price."

"How old are you?" he asked.

"I shall be nineteen in June," I said.

"Why, there's such a discrepancy between your age and your looks,"

he said.

"Oh, that's nothing," I said, "I was born discrepantly."

Then we got to talking about my brother Samuel, and he told me my

explanations were confusing.

"I suppose he is dead," I said. "Some said that he was dead and some

said that he wasn't."

"Did you bury him without knowing whether he was dead or not?" asked

the reporter.

"There was a mystery," said I. "We were twins, and one day when we

were two weeks old- that is, he was one week old, and I was one week

old- we got mixed up in the bath-tub, and one of us drowned. We

never could tell which. One of us had a strawberry birthmark on the

back of his hand. There it is on my hand. This is the one that was

drowned. There's no doubt about it."

"Where's the mystery?" he said.

"Why, don't you see how stupid it was to bury the wrong twin?" I

answered. I didn't explain it any more because he said the explanation

confused him. To me it is perfectly plain.

But, to get back to Fulton. I'm going along like an old man I used

to know who used to start to tell a story about his grandfather. He

had an awfully retentive memory, and he never finished the story,

because he switched off into something else. He used to tell about how

his grandfather one day went into a pasture, where there was a ram.

The old man dropped a silver dime in the grass, and stooped over to

pick it up. The ram was observing him, and took the old man's action

as an invitation.

Just as he was going to finish about the ram this friend of mine

would recall that his grandfather had a niece who had a glass eye. She

used to loan that glass eye to another lady friend, who used it when

she received company. The eye didn't fit the friend's face, and it was

loose. And whenever she winked it would turn over.

Then he got on the subject of accidents, and he would tell a story

about how he believed accidents never happened.

"There was an Irishman coming down a ladder with a hod of bricks,"

he said, "and a Dutchman was standing on the ground below. The

Irishman fell on the Dutchman and killed him. Accident? Never! If

the Dutchman hadn't been there the Irishman would have been killed.

Why didn't the Irishman fall on a dog which was next to the

Dutchman? Because the dog would have seen him coming."

Then he'd get off from the Dutchman to an uncle named Reginald

Wilson. Reginald went into a carpet factory one day, and got twisted

into the machinery's belt. He went excursioning around the factory

until he was properly distributed and was woven into sixty-nine

yards of the best three-ply carpet. His wife bought the carpet, and

then she erected a monument to his memory. It read:

Sacred to the memory

of

sixty-nine yards of the best three-ply carpet

containing the mortal remainders of

REGINALD WILSON

Go thou and do likewise

And so on he would ramble about telling the story of his grandfather

until we never were told whether he found the ten-cent piece or

whether something else happened.

FULTON DAY, JAMESTOWN.

ADDRESS DELIVERED SEPTEMBER 23, 1907.

Lieutenant-Governor Ellyson, of Virginia, in introducing Mr.

Clemens, said:

"The people have come here to bring a tribute of affectionate

recollection for the man who has contributed so much to the progress

of the world and the happiness of mankind." As Mr. Clemens came down

to the platform the applause became louder and louder, until Mr.

Clemens held out his hand for silence. It was a great triumph, and

it was almost a minute after the applause ceased before Mr. Clemens

could speak. He attempted it once, and when the audience noticed his

emotion, it cheered again loudly.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,- I am but human, and when you give me a

reception like that I am obliged to wait a little while I get my

voice. When you appeal to my head, I don't feel it; but when you

appeal to my heart, I do feel it.

We are here to celebrate one of the greatest events of American

history, and not only in American history, but in the world's history.

Indeed it was- the application of steam by Robert Fulton.

It was a world event- there are not many of them. It is peculiarly

an American event, that is true, but the influence was very broad in

effect. We should regard this day as a very great American holiday. We

have not many that are exclusively American holidays. We have the

Fourth of July, which we regard as an American holiday, but it is

nothing of the kind. I am waiting for a dissenting voice. All great

efforts that led up to the Fourth of July were made, not by Americans,

but by English residents of America, subjects of the King of England.

They fought all the fighting that was done, they shed and spilt

all the blood that was spilt, in securing to us the invaluable

liberties which are incorporated in the Declaration of Independence;

but they were not Americans. They signed the Declaration of

Independence; no American's name is signed to that document at all.

There never was an American such as you and I are until after the

Revolution, when it had all been fought out and liberty secured, after

the adoption of the Constitution, and the recognition of the

Independence of America by all powers.

While we revere the Fourth of July- and let us always revere it, and

the liberties it conferred upon us- yet it was not an American

event, a great American day.

It was an American who applied that steam successfully. There are

not a great many world events, and we have our full share. The

telegraph, telephone, and the application of steam to navigation-

these are great American events.

To-day I have been requested, or I have requested myself, not to

confine myself to furnishing you with information, but to remind you

of things, and to introduce one of the nation's celebrants.

Admiral Harrington here is going to tell you all that I have left

untold. I am going to tell you all that I know, and then he will

follow up with such rags and remnants as he can find, and tell you

what he knows.

No doubt you have heard a great deal about Robert Fulton and the

influences that have grown from his invention, but the little

steamboat is suffering neglect.

You probably do not know a great deal about that boat. It was the

most important steamboat in the world. I was there and saw it. Admiral

Harrington was there at the time. It need not surprise you, for he

is not as old as he looks. That little boat was interesting in every

way. The size of it. The boat was one [consults Admiral], he said

ten feet long. The breadth of that boat [consults Admiral], two

hundred feet. You see, the first and most important detail is the

length, then the breadth, and then the depth; the depth of that boat

was [consults again]- the Admiral says it was a flat boat. Then her

tonnage- you know nothing about a boat until you know two more things:

her speed and her tonnage. We know the speed she made. She made four

miles- and sometimes five miles. It was on her initial trip, on August

11, 1807, that she made her initial trip, when she went from [consults

Admiral] Jersey City- to Chicago. That's right. She went by way of

Albany. Now comes the tonnage of that boat. Tonnage of a boat means

the amount of displacement; displacement means the amount of water a

vessel can shove in a day. The tonnage of man is estimated by the

amount of whiskey he can displace in a day.

Robert Fulton named the Clermont in honor of his bride, that is,

Clermont was the name of the county-seat.

I feel that it surprises you that I know so much. In my remarks of

welcome of Admiral Harrington I am not going to give him

compliments. Compliments always embarrass a man. You do not know

anything to say. It does not inspire you with words. There is

nothing you can say in answer to a compliment. I have been

complimented myself a great many times, and they always embarrass

me- I always feel that they have not said enough.

The Admiral and myself have held public office, and were

associated together a great deal in a friendly way in the time of

Pocahontas. That incident where Pocahontas saves the life of Smith

from her father, Powhatan's club, was gotten up by the Admiral and

myself to advertise Jamestown.

At that time the Admiral and myself did not have the facilities of

advertising that you have.

I have known Admiral Harrington in all kinds of situations- in

public service, on the platform, and in the chain-gang now and then-

but it was a mistake. A case of mistaken identity. I do not think it

is at all a necessity to tell you Admiral Harrington's public history.

You know that it is in the histories. I am not here to tell you

anything about his public life, but to expose his private life.

I am something of a poet. When the great poet laureate, Tennyson,

died, and I found that the place was open, I tried to get it- but I

did not get it. Anybody can write the first line of a poem, but it

is a very difficult task to make the second line rhyme with the first.

When I was down in Australia there were two towns named Johnswood

and Par-am. I made this rhyme:

"The people of Johnswood are pious and good;

The people of Par-am they don't care a-"

I do not want to compliment Admiral Harrington, but as long as

such men as he devote their lives to the public service the credit

of the country will never cease. I will say that the same high

qualities, the same moral and intellectual attainments, the same

graciousness of manner, of conduct, of observation, and expression

have caused Admiral Harrington to be mistaken for me- and I have

been mistaken for him.

A mutual compliment can go no further, and I now have the honor

and privilege of introducing to you Admiral Harrington.

LOTOS CLUB DINNER IN HONOR

OF MARK TWAIN.

ADDRESS AT THE FIRST FORMAL DINNER IN THE NEW CLUB-HOUSE,

NOVEMBER 11, 1893.

In introducing the guest of the evening, Mr. Lawrence said:

"To-night the old faces appear once more amid new surroundings.

The place where last we met about the table has vanished, and to-night

we have our first Lotos dinner in a home that is all our own. It is

peculiarly fitting that the board should now be spread in honor of one

who has been a member of the club for full a score of years, and it is

a happy augury for the future that our fellow-member whom we

assemble to greet should be the bearer of a most distinguished name in

the world of letters; for the Lotos Club is ever at its best when

paying homage to genius in literature or in art. Is there a

civilized being who has not heard the name of Mark Twain? We knew

him long years ago, before he came out of the boundless West,

brimful of wit and eloquence, with no reverence for anything, and went

abroad to educate the untutored European in the subtleties of the

American joke. The world has looked on and applauded while he has

broken many images. He has led us in imagination all over the globe.

With him as our guide we have traversed alike the Mississippi and

the Sea of Galilee. At his bidding we have laughed at a thousand

absurdities. By a laborious process of reasoning he has convinced us

that the Egyptian mummies are actually dead. He has held us spellbound

upon the plain at the foot of the great Sphinx, and we have joined him

in weeping bitter tears at the tomb of Adam. To-night we greet him

in the flesh. What name is there in literature that can be likened

to his? Perhaps some of the distinguished gentlemen about this table

can tell us, but I know of none. Himself his only parallel!"

MR. PRESIDENT, GENTLEMEN, AND FELLOW-MEMBERS OF THE LOTOS CLUB,- I

have seldom in my lifetime listened to compliments so felicitously

phrased or so well deserved. I return thanks for them from a full

heart and an appreciative spirit, and I will say this in self-defence:

While I am charged with having no reverence for anything, I wish to

say that I have reverence for the man who can utter such truths, and I

also have a deep reverence and a sincere one for a club that can do

such justice to me. To be the chief guest of such a club is

something to be envied, and if I read your countenances rightly I am

envied. I am glad to see this club in such palatial quarters. I

remember it twenty years ago when it was housed in a stable.

Now when I was studying for the ministry there were two or three

things that struck my attention particularly. At the first banquet

mentioned in history that other prodigal son who came back from his

travels was invited to stand up and have his say. They were all there,

his brethren, David and Goliath, and er, and if he had had such

experience as I have had he would have waited until those other people

got through talking. He got up and testified to all his failings.

Now if he had waited before telling all about his riotous living until

the others had spoken he might not have given himself away as he

did, and I think that I would give myself away if I should go on. I

think I'd better wait until the others hand in their testimony; then

if it is necessary for me to make an explanation, I will get up and

explain, and if I cannot do that, I'll deny it happened.

Later in the evening Mr. Clemens made another speech, replying to

a fire of short speeches by Charles Dudley Warner, Charles A. Dana,

Seth Low, General Porter, and many others, each welcoming the guest of

honor.

I don't see that I have a great deal to explain. I got off very

well, considering the opportunities that these other fellows had. I

don't see that Mr. Low said anything against me, and neither did Mr.

Dana. However, I will say that I never heard so many lies told in

one evening as were told by Mr. McKelway- and I consider myself very

capable; but even in his case, when he got through, I was gratified by

finding how much he hadn't found out. By accident he missed the very

things that I didn't want to have said, and now, gentlemen, about

Americanism.

I have been on the continent of Europe for two and a half years. I

have met many Americans there, some sojourning for a short time

only, others making protracted stays, and it has been very

gratifying to me to find that nearly all preserved their

Americanism. I have found they all like to see the Flag fly, and

that their hearts rise when they see the Stars and Stripes. I met only

one lady who had forgotten the land of her birth and glorified

monarchical institutions.

I think it is a great thing to say that in two and a half years I

met only one person who had fallen a victim to the shams- I think we

may call them shams- of nobilities and of heredities. She was entirely

lost in them. After I had listened to her for a long time, I said to

her: "At least you must admit that we have one merit. We are not

like the Chinese, who refuse to allow their citizens who are tired

of the country to leave it. Thank God, we don't!"

COPYRIGHT

COPYRIGHT.

With Mr. Howells, Edward Everett Hale, Thomas Nelson Page, and a

number of other authors, Mr. Clemens appeared before the committee

December 6, 1906. The new Copyright Bill contemplated an author's

copyright for the term of his life and for fifty years thereafter,

applying also for the benefit of artists, musicians, and others, but

the authors did most of the talking. F. D. Millet made a speech for

the artists, and John Philip Sousa for the musicians.

Mr. Clemens was the last speaker of the day, and its chief

feature. He made a speech, the serious, parts of which created a

strong impression, and the humorous parts set the Senators and

Representatives in roars of laughter.

I HAVE read this bill. At least I have read such portions as I could

understand. Nobody but a practised legislator can read the bill and

thoroughly understand it, and I am not a practised legislator.

I am interested particularly and especially in the part of the

bill which concerns my trade. I like that extension of copyright

life to the author's life and fifty years afterward. I think that

would satisfy any reasonable author, because it would take care of his

children. Let the grand-children take care of themselves. That would

take care of my daughters, and after that I am not particular. I shall

then have long been out of this struggle, independent of it,

indifferent to it.

It isn't objectionable to me that all the trades and professions

in the United States are protected by the bill. I like that. They

are all important and worthy, and if we can take care of them under

the Copyright law I should like to see it done. I should like to see

oyster culture added, and anything else.

I am aware that copyright must have a limit, because that is

required by the Constitution of the United States, which sets aside

the earlier Constitution, which we call the decalogue. The decalogue

says you shall not take away from any man his profit. I don't like

to be obliged to use the harsh term. What the decalogue really says

is, "Thou shalt not steal," but I am trying to use more polite

language.

The laws of England and America do take it away, do select but one

class, the people who create the literature of the land. They always

talk handsomely about the literature of the land, always what a

fine, great, monumental thing a great literature is, and in the

midst of their enthusiasm they turn around and do what they can to

discourage it.

I know we must have a limit, but forty-two years is too much of a

limit. I am quite unable to guess why there should be a limit at all

to the possession of the product of a man's labor. There is no limit

to real estate.

Doctor Hale has suggested that a man might just as well, after

discovering a coal-mine and working it forty-two years, have the

Government step in and take it away.

What is the excuse? It is that the author who produced that book has

had the profit of it long enough, and therefore the Government takes a

profit which does not belong to it and generously gives it to the

88,000,000 of people. But it doesn't do anything of the kind. It

merely takes the author's property, takes his children's bread, and

gives the publisher double profit. He goes on publishing the book

and as many of his confederates as choose to go into the conspiracy do

so, and they rear families in affluence.

And they continue the enjoyment of those ill-gotten gains generation

after generation forever, for they never die. In a few weeks or months

or years I shall be out of it, I hope under a monument. I hope I shall

not be entirely forgotten, and I shall subscribe to the monument

myself. But I shall not be caring what happens if there are fifty

years left of my copyright. My copyright produces annually a good deal

more than I can use, but my children can use it. I can get along; I

know a lot of trades. But that goes to my daughters, who can't get

along as well as I can because I have carefully raised them as young

ladies, who don't know anything and can't do anything. I hope Congress

will extend to them the charity which they have failed to get from me.

Why, if a man who is not even mad, but only strenuous- strenuous

about race- suicide- should come to me and try to get me to use my

large political and ecclesiastical influence to get a bill passed by

this Congress limiting families to twenty-two children by one

mother, I should try to calm him down. I should reason with him. I

should say to him, "Leave it alone. Leave it alone and it will take

care of itself. Only one couple a year in the United States can

reach that limit. If they have reached that limit let them go right

on. Let them have all the liberty they want. In restricting that

family to twenty-two children you are merely conferring discomfort and

unhappiness on one family per year in a nation of 88,000,000, which is

not worth while."

It is the very same with copyright. One author per year produces a

book which can outlive the forty-two-year limit; that's all. This

nation can't produce two authors a year that can do it; the thing is

demonstrably impossible. All that the limited copyright can do is to

take the bread out of the mouths of the children of that one author

per year.

I made an estimate some years ago, when I appeared before a

committee of the House of Lords, that we had published in this country

since the Declaration of Independence 220,000 books. They have all

gone. They had all perished before they were ten years old. It is only

one book in 1000 that can outlive the forty-two-year limit.

Therefore why put a limit at all? You might as well limit the family

to twenty-two children.

If you recall the Americans in the nineteenth century who wrote

books that lived forty-two years you will have to begin with Cooper;

you can follow with Washington Irving, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Edgar

Allan Poe, and there you have to wait a long time. You come to

Emerson, and you have to stand still and look further. You find

Howells and T. B. Aldrich, and, then your numbers begin to run

pretty thin, and you question if you can name twenty persons in the

United States who in a whole century have written books that would

live forty-two years. Why, you could take them all and put them on one

bench there [pointing]. Add the wives and children and you could put

the result on two or three more benches.

One hundred persons- that is the little, insignificant crowd whose

bread-and-butter is to be taken away for what purpose, for what profit

to anybody? You turn these few books into the hands of the pirate

and of the legitimate publisher, too, and they get the profit that

should have gone to the wife and children.

When I appeared before that committee of the House of Lords the

chairman asked me what limit I would propose. I said, "Perpetuity."

I could see some resentment in his manner, and he said the idea was

illogical, for the reason that it has long ago been decided that there

can be no such thing as property in ideas. I said there was property

in ideas before Queen Anne's time; they had perpetual copyright. He

said, "What is a book? A book is just built from base to roof on

ideas, and there can be no property in it."

I said I wished he could mention any kind of property on this planet

that had a pecuniary value which was not derived from an idea or

ideas. He said real estate. I put a supposititious case, a dozen

Englishmen who travel through South Africa and camp out, and eleven of

them see nothing at all; they are mentally blind. But there is one

in the party who knows what this harbor means and what the lay of

the land means. To him it means that some day a railway will go

through here, and there on that harbor a great city will spring up.

That is his idea. And he has another idea, which is to go and trade

his last bottle of Scotch whiskey and his last horse-blanket to the

principal chief of that region and buy a piece of land the size of

Pennsylvania. That was the value of an idea that the day would come

when the Cape to Cairo Railway would be built.

Every improvement that is put upon the real estate is the result

of an idea in somebody's head. The skyscraper is another idea; the

railroad is another; the telephone and all those things are merely

symbols which represent ideas. An andiron, a wash-tub, is the result

of an idea that did not exist before.

So if, as that gentleman said, a book does consist solely of

ideas, that is the best argument in the world that it is property, and

should not be under any limitation at all. We don't ask for that.

Fifty years from now we shall ask for it.

I hope the bill will pass without any deleterious amendments. I do

seem to be extraordinarily interested in a whole lot of arts and

things that I have got nothing to do with. It is a part of my

generous, liberal nature; I can't help it. I feel the same sort of

charity to everybody that was manifested by a gentleman who arrived at

home at two o'clock in the morning from the club and was feeling so

perfectly satisfied with life, so happy, and so comfortable, and there

was his house weaving, weaving, weaving around. He watched his chance,

and by and by when the steps got in his neighborhood he made a jump

and climbed up and got on the portico.

And the house went on weaving and weaving and weaving, but he

watched the door, and when it came around his way he plunged through

it. He got to the stairs, and when he went up on all fours the house

was so unsteady that he could hardly make his way, but at last he

got to the top and raised his foot and put it on the top step. But

only the toe hitched on the step, and he rolled down and fetched up on

the bottom step, with his arm around the newel-post, and he said: "God

pity the poor sailors out at sea on a night like this."

IN AID OF THE BLIND.

ADDRESS AT A PUBLIC MEETING OF THE NEW YORK

ASSOCIATION FOR PROMOTING THE INTERESTS

OF THE BLIND AT THE WALDORF-ASTORIA,

MARCH 29, 1906.

IF You detect any awkwardness in my movements and infelicities in my

conduct I will offer the explanation that I never presided at a

meeting of any kind before in my life, and that I do find it out of my

line. I supposed I could do anything anybody else could, but I

recognize that experience helps, and I do feel the lack of that

experience. I don't feel as graceful and easy as I ought to be

in-order to impress an audience. I shall not pretend that I know how

to umpire a meeting like this, and I shall just take the humble

place of the Essex band.

There was a great gathering in a small New England town about

twenty-five years ago. I remember that circumstance because there

was something that happened at that time. It was a great occasion.

They gathered in the militia and orators and everybody from all the

towns around. It was an extraordinary occasion.

The little local paper threw itself into ecstasies of admiration and

tried to do itself proud from beginning to end. It praised the

orators, the militia, and all the bands that came from everywhere, and

all this in honest country newspaper detail, but the writer ran out of

adjectives toward the end. Having exhausted his whole magazine of

praise and glorification, he found he still had one band left over. He

had to say something about it, and he said: "The Essex band done the

best it could."

I am an Essex band on this occasion, and I am going to get through

as well as inexperience and good intentions will enable me. I have got

all the documents here necessary to instruct you in the objects and

intentions of this meeting and also of the association which has

called the meeting. But they are too voluminous. I could not pack

those statistics into my head, and I had to give it up. I shall have

to just reduce all that mass of statistics to a few salient facts.

There are too many statistics and figures for me. I never could do

anything with figures, never had any talent for mathematics, never

accomplished anything in my efforts at that rugged study, and to-day

the only mathematics I know is multiplication, and the minute I get

away up in that, as soon as I reach nine times seven-

[Mr. Clemens lapsed into deep thought for a moment. He was trying to

figure out nine times seven, but it was a hopeless task, and he turned

to St. Clair McKelway, who sat near him. Mr. McKelway whispered the

answer, and the speaker resumed:]

I've got it now. It's eighty-four. Well, I can get that far all

right with a little hesitation. After that I am uncertain, and I can't

manage a statistic.

"This association for the"-

[Mr. Clemens was in another dilemma. Again he was obliged to turn to

Mr. McKelway.]

Oh yes, for promoting the interests of the blind. It's a long

name. If I could I would write it out for you and let you take it home

and study it, but I don't know how to spell it. And Mr. Carnegie is

down in Virginia somewhere. Well, anyway, the object of that

association which has been recently organized, five months ago, in

fact, is in the hands of very, very energetic, intelligent, and

capable people, and they will push it to success very surely, and

all the more surely if you will give them a little of your

assistance out of your pockets.

The intention, the purpose, is to search out all the blind and

find work for them to do so that they may earn their own bread. Now it

is dismal enough to be blind- it is dreary, dreary life at best, but

it can be largely ameliorated by finding something for these poor

blind people to do with their hands. The time passes so heavily that

it is never day or night with them, it is always night, and when

they have to sit with folded hands and with nothing to do to amuse

or entertain or employ their minds, it is drearier and drearier.

And then the knowledge they have that they must subsist on

charity, and so often reluctant charity, it would renew their lives if

they could have something to do with their hands and pass their time

and at the same time earn their bread, and know the sweetness of the

bread which is the result of the labor of one's own hands. They need

that cheer and pleasure. It is the only way you can turn their night

into day, to give them happy hearts, the only thing you can put in the

place of the blessed sun. That you can do in the way I speak of.

Blind people generally who have seen the light know what it is to

miss the light. Those who have gone blind since they were twenty years

old- their lives are unendingly dreary. But they can be taught to

use their hands and to employ themselves at a great many industries.

That association from which this draws its birth in Cambridge,

Massachusetts, has taught its blind to make many things. They make

them better than most people, and more honest than people who have the

use of their eyes. The goods they make are readily salable. People

like them. And so they are supporting themselves, and it is a matter

of cheer, cheer. They pass their time now not too irksomely as they

formerly did.

What this association needs and wants is $15,000. The figures are

set down, and what the money is for, and there is no graft in it or

I would not be here. And they hope to beguile that out of your

pockets, and you will find affixed to the programme an opportunity,

that little blank which you will fill out and promise so much money

now or to-morrow or some time. Then, there is another opportunity

which is still better, and that is that you shall subscribe an

annual sum.

I have invented a good many useful things in my time, but never

anything better than that of getting money out of people who don't

want to part with it. It is always for good objects, of course. This

is the plan: When you call upon a person to contribute to a great

and good object, and you think he should furnish about $1000, he

disappoints you as like as not. Much the best way to work him to

supply that thousand dollars is to split it into parts and contribute,

say a hundred dollars a year, or fifty, or whatever the sum may be.

Let him contribute ten or twenty a year. He doesn't feel that, but

he does feel it when you call upon him to contribute a large amount.

When you get used to it you would rather contribute than borrow money.

I tried it in Helen Keller's case. Mr. Hutton wrote me in 1896 or

1897 when I was in London and said: "The gentleman who has been so

liberal in taking care of Helen Keller has died without making

provision for her in his will, and now they don't know what to do."

They were proposing to raise a fund, and he thought $50,000 enough

to furnish an income of $2400 or $2500 a year for the support of

that wonderful girl and her wonderful teacher, Miss Sullivan, now Mrs.

Macy. I wrote to Mr. Hutton and said: "Go on, get up your fund. It

will be slow, but if you want quick work, I propose this system,"

the system I speak of, of asking people to contribute such and such

a sum from year to year and drop out whenever they please, and he

would find there wouldn't be any difficulty, people wouldn't feel

the burden of it. And he wrote back saying he had raised the $2400 a

year indefinitely by that system in a single afternoon. We would

like to do something just like that to-night. We will take as many

checks as you care to give. You can leave your donations in the big

room outside.

I knew once what it was to be blind. I shall never forget that

experience. I have been as blind as anybody ever was for three or four

hours, and the sufferings that I endured and the mishaps and the

accidents that are burning in my memory make my sympathy rise when I

feel for the blind and always shall feel. I once went to Heidelberg on

an excursion. I took a clergyman along with me, the Rev. Joseph

Twichell, of Hartford, who is still among the living despite that

fact. I always travel with clergymen when I can. It is better for

them, it is better for me. And any preacher who goes out with me in

stormy weather and without a lightning rod is a good one. The Reverend

Twichell is one of those people filled with patience and endurance,

two good ingredients for a man travelling with me, so we got along

very well together. In that old town they have not altered a house nor

built one in 1500 years. We went to the inn and they placed Twichell

and me in a most colossal bedroom, the largest I ever saw or heard of.

It was as big as this room.

I didn't take much notice of the place. I didn't really get my

bearings. I noticed Twichell got a German bed about two feet wide, the

kind in which you've got to lie on your edge, because there isn't room

to lie on your back, and he was way down south in that big room, and I

was way up north at the other end of it, with a regular Sahara in

between.

We went to bed. Twichell went to sleep, but then he had his

conscience loaded and it was easy for him to get to sleep. I

couldn't get to sleep. It was one of those torturing kinds of lovely

summer nights when you hear various kinds of noises now and then. A

mouse away off in the southwest. You throw things at the mouse. That

encourages the mouse. But I couldn't stand it, and about two o'clock I

got up and thought I would give it up and go out in the square where

there was one of those tinkling fountains, and sit on its brink and

dream, full of romance.

I got out of bed, and I ought to have lit a candle, but I didn't

think of it until it was too late. It was the darkest place that

ever was. There has never been darkness any thicker than that. It just

lay in cakes.

I thought that before dressing I would accumulate my clothes. I

pawed around in the dark and found everything packed together on the

floor except one sock. I couldn't get on the track of that sock. It

might have occurred to me that maybe it was in the wash. But I

didn't think of that. I went excursioning on my hands and knees.

Presently I thought, "I am never going to find it; I'll go back to bed

again." That is what I tried to do during the next three hours. I

had lost the bearings of that bed. I was going in the wrong

direction all the time. By-and-by I came in collision with a chair and

that encouraged me.

It seemed to me, as far as I could recollect, there was only a chair

here and there and yonder, five or six of them scattered over this

territory, and I thought maybe after I found that chair I might find

the next one. Well, I did. And I found another and another and

another. I kept going around on my hands and knees, having those

sudden collisions, and finally when I banged into another chair I

almost lost my temper. And I raised up, garbed as I was, not for

public exhibition, right in front of a mirror fifteen or sixteen

feet high.

I hadn't noticed the mirror; didn't know it was there. And when I

saw myself in the mirror I was frightened out of my wits. I don't

allow any ghosts to bite me, and I took up a chair and smashed at

it. A million pieces. Then I reflected. That's the way I always do,

and it's unprofitable unless a man has had much experience that way

and has clear judgment. And I had judgment, and I would have had to

pay for that mirror if I hadn't recollected to say it was Twichell who

broke it.

Then I got down on my hands and knees and went on another

exploring expedition.

As far as I could remember there were six chairs in that Oklahoma,

and one table, a great big heavy table, not a good table to hit with

your head when rushing madly along. In the course of time I collided

with thirty-five chairs and tables enough to stock that dining-room

out there. It was a hospital for decayed furniture, and it was in a

worse condition when I got through with it. I went on and on, and at

last got to a place where I could feel my way up, and there was a

shelf. I knew that wasn't in the middle of the room. Up to that time I

was afraid I had gotten out of the city.

I was very careful and pawed along that shelf, and there was a

pitcher of water about a foot high, and it was at the head of

Twichell's bed, but I didn't know it. I felt that pitcher going and

I grabbed at it, but it didn't help any and came right down in

Twichell's face and nearly drowned him. But it woke him up. I was

grateful to have company on any terms. He lit a match, and there I

was, way down south when I ought to have been back up yonder. My bed

was out of sight it was so far away. You needed a telescope to find

it. Twichell comforted me and I scrubbed him off and we got sociable.

But that night wasn't wasted. I had my pedometer on my leg. Twichell

and I were in a pedometer match. Twichell had longer legs than I.

The only way I could keep up was to wear my pedometer to bed. I always

walk in my sleep, and on this occasion I gained sixteen miles on

him. After all, I never found that sock. I never have seen it from

that day to this. But that adventure taught me what it is to be blind.

That was one of the most serious occasions of my whole life, yet I

never can speak of it without somebody thinking it isn't serious.

You try it and see how serious it is to be as the blind are and I

was that night.

[Mr. Clemens read several letters of regret. He then introduced

Joseph H. Choate, saying:]

It is now my privilege to present to you Mr. Choate. I don't have to

really introduce him. I don't have to praise him, or to flatter him. I

could say truly that in the forty-seven years I have been familiarly

acquainted with him he has always been the handsomest man America

has ever produced. And I hope and believe he will hold the belt

forty-five years more. He has served his country ably, faithfully, and

brilliantly. He stands at the summit, at the very top in the esteem

and regard of his countrymen, and if I could say one word which

would lift him any higher in his countrymen's esteem and affection,

I would say that word whether it was true or not.

DR. MARK TWAIN, FARMEOPATH.

ADDRESS AT THE ANNUAL DINNER OF THE NEW YORK POST-GRADUATE

MEDICAL SCHOOL AND HOSPITAL, JANUARY 21, 1909.

The president, Dr. George N. Miller, in introducing Mr. Clemens,

referred to his late experience with burglars.

GENTLEMEN AND DOCTORS,- I am glad to be among my own kind

to-night. I was once a sharpshooter, but now I practise a much

higher and equally as deadly a profession. It wasn't so very long

ago that I became a member of your cult, and for the time I've been in

the business my record is one that can't be scoffed at.

As to the burglars, I am perfectly familiar with these people. I

have always had a good deal to do with burglars- not officially, but

through their attentions to me. I never suffered anything at the hands

of a burglar. They have invaded my house time and time again. They

never got anything. Then those people who burglarized our house in

September- we got back the plated ware they took off, we jailed

them, and I have been sorry ever since. They did us a great service-

they scared off all the servants in the place.

I consider the Children's Theatre, of which I am president, and

the Post-Graduate Medical School as the two greatest institutions in

the country. This school, in bringing its twenty thousand physicians

from all parts of the country, bringing them up to date, and sending

them back with renewed confidence, has surely saved hundreds of

thousands of lives which otherwise would have been lost.

I have been practising now for seven months. When I settled on my

farm in Connecticut in June I found the community very thinly settled-

and since I have been engaged in practice it has become more thinly

settled still. This gratifies me, as indicating that I am making an

impression on my community. I suppose it is the same with all of you.

I have always felt that I ought to do something for you, and so I

organized a Redding (Connecticut) branch of the Post-Graduate

School. I am only a country farmer up there, but I am doing the best I

can.

Of course, the practice of medicine and surgery in a remote

country district has its disadvantages, but in my case I am happy in a

division of responsibility. I practise in conjunction with a

horse-doctor, a sexton, and an undertaker. The combination is

air-tight, and once a man is stricken in our district escape is

impossible for him.

These four of us- three in the regular profession and the fourth

an undertaker- are all good men. There is Bill Ferguson, the Redding

undertaker. Bill is there in every respect. He is a little lukewarm on

general practice, and writes his name with a rubber stamp. Like my old

Southern friend, he is one of the finest planters anywhere.

Then there is Jim Ruggles, the horse-doctor. Ruggles is one of the

best men I have got. He also is not much on general medicine, but he

is a fine horse-doctor. Ferguson doesn't make any money off him.

You see, the combination started this way. When I got up to

Redding and had become a doctor, I looked around to see what my

chances were for aiding in the great work. The first thing I did was

to determine what manner of doctor I was to be. Being a Connecticut

farmer, I naturally consulted my farmacopia, and at once decided to

become a farmeopath.

Then I got circulating about, and got in touch with Ferguson and

Ruggles. Ferguson joined readily in my ideas, but Ruggles kept

saying that, while it was all right for an undertaker to get aboard,

he couldn't see where it helped horses.

Well, we started to find out what was the trouble with the

community, and it didn't take long to find out that there was just one

disease, and that was race-suicide. And driving about the country-side

I was told by my fellow-farmers that it was the only rational human

and valuable disease. But it is cutting into our profits so that we'll

either have to stop it or we'll have to move.

We've had some funny experiences up there in Redding. Not long ago a

fellow came along with a rolling gait and a distressed face. We

asked him what was the matter. We always hold consultations on every

case, as there isn't business enough for four. He said he didn't know,

but that he was a sailor, and perhaps that might help us to give a

diagnosis. We treated him for that, and I never saw a man die more

peacefully.

That same afternoon my dog Tige treed an African gentleman. We

chained up the dog, and then the gentleman came down and said he had

appendicitis. We asked him if he wanted to be cut open, and he said

yes, that he'd like to know if there was anything in it. So we cut him

open and found nothing in him but darkness. So we diagnosed his case

as infidelity, because he was dark inside. Tige is a very clever

dog, and aids us greatly.

The other day a patient came to me and inquired if I was old

Doctor Clemens-

As a practitioner I have given a great deal of my attention to

Bright's disease. I have made some rules for treating it that may be

valuable. Listen:

Rule 1. When approaching the bedside of one whom an all-wise

President- I mean an all-wise Providence- well, anyway, it's the

same thing- has seen fit to afflict with disease- well, the rule is

simple, even if it is old-fashioned.

Rule 2. I've forgotten just what it is, but-

Rule 3. This is always indispensable: Bleed your patient.

MISSOURI UNIVERSITY SPEECH.

ADDRESS DELIVERED JUNE 4, 1902, AT COLUMBIA, MO.

When the name of Samuel L. Clemens was called the humorist stepped

forward, put his hand to his hair, and apparently hesitated. There was

a dead silence for a moment. Suddenly the entire audience rose and

stood in silence. Some one began to spell out the word Missouri with

an interval between the letters. All joined in. Then the house again

became silent. Mr. Clemens broke the spell:

AS you are all standing [he drawled in his characteristic voice],

I guess, I suppose I had better stand too.

[Then came a laugh and loud cries for a speech. As the great

humorist spoke of his recent visit to Hannibal, his old home, his

voice trembled.]

You cannot know what a strain it was on my emotions [he said]. In

fact, when I found myself shaking hands with persons I had not seen

for fifty years and looking into wrinkled faces that were so young and

joyous when I last saw them, I experienced emotions that I had never

expected, and did not know were in me. I was profoundly moved and

saddened to think that this was the last time, perhaps, that I would

ever behold those kind old faces and dear old scenes of childhood.

[The humorist then changed to a lighter mood, and for a time the

audience was in a continual roar of laughter. He was particularly

amused at the eulogy on himself read by Gardiner Lathrop in conferring

the degree.] He has a fine opportunity to distinguish himself [said

Mr. Clemens] by telling the truth about me.

I have seen it stated in print that as a boy I had been guilty of

stealing peaches, apples, and watermelons. I read a story to this

effect very closely not long ago, and I was convinced of one thing,

which was that the man who wrote it was of the opinion that it was

wrong to steal, and that I had not acted right in doing so. I wish

now, however, to make an honest statement, which is that I do not

believe, in all my checkered career, I stole a ton of peaches.

One night I stole- I mean I removed- a watermelon from a wagon while

the owner was attending to another customer. I crawled off to a

secluded spot, where I found that it was green. It was the greenest

melon in the Mississippi Valley. Then I began to reflect. I began to

be sorry. I wondered what George Washington would have done had he

been in my place. I thought a long time, and then suddenly felt that

strange feeling which comes to a man with a good resolution, and

took up that watermelon and took it back to its owner. I handed him

the watermelon and told him to reform. He took my lecture much to

heart, and, when he gave me a good one in place of the green melon,

I forgave him.

I told him that I would still be a customer of his, and that I

cherished no ill-feeling because of the incident- that would remain

green in my memory.

BUSINESS

BUSINESS.

The alumni of Eastman College gave their annual banquet, March 30,

1901, at the Y. M. C. A. Building. Mr. James G. Cannon, of the

Fourth National Bank, made the first speech of the evening, after

which Mr. Clemens was introduced by Mr. Bailey as the personal

friend of Tom Sawyer, who was one of the types of successful

business men.

MR. CANNON has furnished me with texts enough to last as slow a

speaker as myself all the rest of the night. I took exception to the

introducing of Mr. Cannon as a great financier, as if he were the only

great financier present. I am a financier. But my methods are not

the same as Mr. Cannon's.

I cannot say that I have turned out the great business man that I

thought I was when I began life. But I am comparatively young yet, and

may learn. I am rather inclined to believe that what troubled me was

that I got the big-head early in the game. I want to explain to you

a few points of difference between the principles of business as I see

them and those that Mr. Cannon believes in.

He says that the primary rule of business success is loyalty to your

employer. That's all right- as a theory. What is the matter with

loyalty to yourself? As nearly as I can understand Mr. Cannon's

methods, there is one great drawback to them. He wants you to work a

great deal. Diligence is a good thing, but taking things easy is

much more- restful. My idea is that the employer should be the busy

man, and the employee the idle one. The employer should be the worried

man, and the employee the happy one. And why not? He gets the

salary. My plan is to get another man to do the work for me. In that

there's more repose. What I want is repose first, last, and all the

time.

Mr. Cannon says that there are three cardinal rules of business

success; they are diligence, honesty, and truthfulness. Well,

diligence is all right. Let it go as a theory. Honesty is the best

policy- when there is money in it. But truthfulness is one of the most

dangerous- why, this man is misleading you.

I had an experience to-day with my wife which illustrates this. I

was acknowledging a belated invitation to another dinner for this

evening, which seemed to have been sent about ten days ago. It only

reached me this morning. I was mortified at the discourtesy into which

I had been brought by this delay, and wondered what was being

thought of me by my hosts. As I had accepted your invitation, of

course I had to send regrets to my other friends.

When I started to write this note my wife came up and stood

looking over my shoulder. Women always want to know what is going

on. Said she: "Should not that read in the third person?" I conceded

that it should, put aside what I was writing, and commenced over

again. That seemed to satisfy her, and so she sat down and let me

proceed. I then finished my first note- and so sent what I intended. I

never could have done this if I had let my wife know the truth about

it. Here is what I wrote:

TO THE OHIO SOCIETY,- I have at this moment received a most kind

invitation (eleven days old) from Mr. Southard, president; and a

like one (ten days old) from Mr. Bryant, president of the Press

Club. I thank the society cordially for the compliment of these

invitations, although I am booked elsewhere and cannot come.

But, oh, I should like to know the name of the Lightning Express

by which they were forwarded; for I owe a friend a dozen chickens, and

I believe it will be cheaper to send eggs instead, and let them

develop on the road.

Sincerely yours, MARK TWAIN.

I want to tell you of some of my experiences in business, and then I

will be in a position to lay down one general rule for the guidance of

those who want to succeed in business. My first effort was about

twenty-five years ago. I took hold of an invention- I don't know now

what it was all about, but some one came to me and told me it was a

good thing, and that there was lots of money in it. He persuaded me to

invest $15,000, and I lived up to my beliefs by engaging a man to

develop it. To make a long story short, I sunk $40,000 in it.

Then I took up the publication of a book. I called in a publisher

and said to him: "I want you to publish this book along lines which

I shall lay down. I am the employer, and you are the employee. I am

going to show them some new kinks in the publishing business. And I

want you to draw on me for money as you go along," which he did. He

drew on me for $56,000. Then I asked him to take the book and call

it off. But he refused to do that.

My next venture was with a machine for doing something or other. I

knew less about that than I did about the invention. But I sunk

$170,000 in the business, and I can't for the life of me recollect

what it was the machine was to do.

I was still undismayed. You see, one of the strong points about my

business life was that I never gave up. I undertook to publish General

Grant's book, and made $140,000 in six months. My axiom is, to succeed

in business: avoid my example.

CARNEGIE THE BENEFACTOR.

At the dinner given in honor of Andrew Carnegie by the Lotos Club,

March 17, 1909, Mr. Clemens appeared in a white suit from head to

feet. He wore a white double-breasted coat, white trousers, and

white shoes. The only relief was a big black cigar, which he

confidentially informed the company was not from his usual stack

bought at $3 per barrel.

THE State of Missouri has for its coat of arms a barrel-head with

two Missourians, one on each side of it, and mark the motto- "United

We Stand, Divided We Fall." Mr. Carnegie, this evening, has suffered

from compliments. It is interesting to hear what people will say about

a man. Why, at the banquet given by this club in my honor, Mr.

Carnegie had the inspiration for which the club is now honoring him.

If Dunfermline contributed so much to the United States in

contributing Mr. Carnegie, what would have happened if all Scotland

had turned out? These Dunfermline folk have acquired advantages in

coming to America.

Doctor McKelway paid the top compliment, the cumulation, when he

said of Mr. Carnegie: "There is a man who wants to pay more taxes than

he is charged." Richard Watson Gilder did very well for a poet. He

advertised his magazine. He spoke of hiring Mr. Carnegie- the next

thing he will be trying to hire me.

If I undertook to pay compliments I would do it stronger than any

others have done it, for what Mr. Carnegie wants are strong

compliments. Now, the other side of seventy, I have preserved, as my

chiefest virtue, modesty.

ON POETRY, VERACITY, AND SUICIDE.

ADDRESS AT A DINNER OF THE MANHATTAN DICKENS FELLOWSHIP,

NEW YORK CITY, FEBRUARY 7, 1906.

This dinner was in commemoration of the ninety-fourth anniversary of

the birth of Charles Dickens. On another occasion Mr. Clemens told the

same story with variations and a different conclusion to the

University Settlement Society.

I ALWAYS had taken an interest in young people who wanted to

become poets. I remember I was particularly interested in one

budding poet when I was a reporter. His name was Butter.

One day he came to me and said, disconsolately, that he was going to

commit suicide- he was tired of life, not being able to express his

thoughts in poetic form. Butter asked me what I thought of the idea.

I said I would; that it was a good idea. "You can do me a friendly

turn. You go off in a private place and do it there, and I'll get it

all. You do it, and I'll do as much for you some time."

At first he determined to drown himself. Drowning is so nice and

clean, and writes up so well in a newspaper.

But things ne'er do go smoothly in weddings, suicides, or

courtships. Only there at the edge of the water, where Butter was to

end himself, lay a life-preserver- a big round canvas one, which would

float after the scrap-iron was soaked out of it.

Butter wouldn't kill himself with the life-preserver in sight, and

so I had an idea. I took it to a pawnshop, and soaked it for a

revolver. The pawnbroker didn't think much of the exchange, but when I

explained the situation he acquiesced. We went up on top of a high

building, and this is what happened to the poet:

He put the revolver to his forehead and blew a tunnel straight

through his head. The tunnel was about the size of your finger. You

could look right through it. The job was complete; there was nothing

in it.

Well, after that that man never could write prose, but he could

write poetry. He could write it after he had blown his brains out.

There is lots of that talent all over the country, but the trouble

is they don't develop it.

I am suffering now from the fact that I, who have told the truth a

good many times in my life, have lately received more letters than

anybody else urging me to lead a righteous life. I have more friends

who want to see me develop on a high level than anybody else.

Young John D. Rockefeller, two weeks ago, taught his Bible class all

about veracity, and why it was better that everybody should always

keep a plentiful supply on hand. Some of the letters I have received

suggest that I ought to attend his class and learn, too. Why, I know

Mr. Rockefeller, and he is a good fellow. He is competent in many ways

to teach a Bible class, but when it comes to veracity he is only

thirty-five years old. I'm seventy years old. I have been familiar

with veracity twice as long as he.

And the story about George Washington and his little hatchet has

also been suggested to me in these letters- in a fugitive way, as if I

needed some of George Washington and his hatchet in my constitution.

Why, dear me, they overlook the real point in that story. The point is

not the one that is usually suggested, and you can readily see that.

The point is not that George said to his father, "Yes, father, I cut

down the cheery-tree; I can't tell a lie," but that the little boy-

only seven years old- should have his sagacity developed under such

circumstances. He was a boy wise beyond his years. His conduct then

was a prophecy of later years. Yes, I think he was the most remarkable

man the country ever produced- up to my time, anyway.

Now then, little George realized that circumstantial evidence was

against him. He knew that his father would know from the size of the

chips that no full-grown hatchet cut that tree down, and that no man

would have haggled it so. He knew that his father would send around

the plantation and inquire for a small boy with a hatchet, and he

had the wisdom to come out and confess it. Now, the idea that his

father was overjoyed when he told little George that he would rather

have him cut down a thousand cheery-trees than tell a lie is all

nonsense. What did he really mean? Why, that he was absolutely

astonished that he had a son who had the chance to tell a lie and

didn't.

I admire old George- if that was his name- for his discernment. He

knew when he said that his son couldn't tell a lie that he was

stretching it a good deal. He wouldn't have to go to John D.

Rockefeller's Bible class to find that out. The way the old George

Washington story goes down it doesn't do anybody any good. It only

discourages people who can- tell a lie.

WELCOME HOME.

ADDRESS AT THE DINNER IN HIS HONOR AT THE

LOTOS CLUB, NOVEMBER 10, 1900.

In August, 1895, just before sailing for Australia, Mr. Clemens

issued the following statement:

"It has been reported that I sacrificed, for the benefit of the

creditors, the property of the publishing firm whose financial

backer I was, and that I am now lecturing for my own benefit.

"This is an error. I intend the lectures, as well as the property,

for the creditors. The law recognizes no mortgage on a man's brains,

and a merchant who has given up all he has may take advantage of the

laws of insolvency and may start free again for himself. But I am

not a business man, and honor is a harder master than the law. It

cannot compromise for less than one hundred cents on a dollar, and its

debts are never outlawed.

"I had a two-thirds interest in the publishing firm whose capital

I furnished. If the firm had prospered I would have expected to

collect two-thirds of the profits. As it is, I expect to pay all the

debts. My partner has no resources, and I do not look for assistance

to my wife, whose contributions in cash from her own means have nearly

equalled the claims of all the creditors combined. She has taken

nothing; on the contrary, she has helped and intends to help me to

satisfy the obligations due to the rest of the creditors.

"It is my intention to ask my creditors to accept that as a legal

discharge, and trust to my honor to pay the other fifty per cent. as

fast as I can earn it. From my reception thus far on my lecturing

tour, I am confident that if I live I can pay off the last debt within

four years.

"After which, at the age of sixty-four, I can make a fresh and

unincumbered start in life. I am going to Australia, India, and

South Africa, and next year I hope to make a tour of the great

cities of the United States."

I THANK you all out of my heart for this fraternal welcome, and it

seems almost too fine, almost too magnificent, for a humble Missourian

such as I am, far from his native haunts on the banks of the

Mississippi; yet my modesty is in a degree fortified by observing that

I am not the only Missourian who has been honored here to-night, for I

see at this very table- here is a Missourian [indicating Mr.

McKelway], and there is a Missourian [indicating Mr. Depew], and there

is another Missourian- and Hendrix and Clemens; and last but not

least, the greatest Missourian of them all- here he sits- Tom Reed,

who has always concealed his birth till now. And since I have been

away I know what has been happening in his case: he has deserted

politics, and now is leading a creditable life. He has reformed, and

God prosper him; and I judge, by a remark which he made up-stairs

awhile ago, that he had found a new business that is utterly suited to

his make and constitution, and all he is doing now is that he is

around raising the average of personal beauty.

But I am grateful to the president for the kind words which he has

said of me, and it is not for me to say whether these praises were

deserved or not. I prefer to accept them just as they stand, without

concerning myself with the statistics upon which they have been built,

but only with that large matter, that essential matter, the

good-fellowship, the kindliness, the magnanimity, and generosity

that prompted their utterance. Well, many things have happened since I

sat here before, and now that I think of it, the president's reference

to the debts which were left by the bankrupt firm of Charles L.

Webster & Co. gives me an opportunity to say a word which I very

much wish to say, not for myself, but for ninety-five men and women

whom I shall always hold in high esteem and in pleasant remembrance-

the creditors of that firm. They treated me well; they treated me

handsomely. There were ninety-six of them, and by not a finger's

weight did ninety-five of them add to the burden of that time for

me. Ninety-five out of the ninety-six- they didn't indicate by any

word or sign that they were anxious about their money. They treated me

well, and I shall not forget it; I could not forget it if I wanted to.

Many of them said, "Don't you worry, don't you hurry"; that's what

they said. Why, if I could have that kind of creditors always, and

that experience, I would recognize it as a personal loss to be out

of debt. I owe those ninety-five creditors a debt of homage, and I pay

it now in such measure as one may pay so fine a debt in mere words.

Yes, they said that very thing. I was not personally acquainted with

ten of them, and yet they said, "Don't you worry, and don't you

hurry." I know that phrase by heart, and if all the other music should

perish out of the world it would still sing to me. I appreciate

that; I am glad to say this word; people say so much about me, and

they forget those creditors. They were handsomer than I was- or Tom

Reed.

Oh, you have been doing many things in this time that I have been

absent; you have done lots of things, some that are well worth

remembering, too. Now, we have fought a righteous war since I have

gone, and that is rare in history- a righteous war is so rare that

it is almost unknown in history; but by the grace of that war we set

Cuba free, and we joined her to those three or four nations that exist

on this earth; and we started out to set those poor Filipinos free,

too, and why, why, why that most righteous purpose of ours has

apparently miscarried I suppose I never shall know.

But we have made a most creditable record in China in these days-

our sound and level-headed administration has made a most creditable

record over there, and there are some of the Powers that cannot say

that by any means. The Yellow Terror is threatening this world to-day.

It is looming vast and ominous on that distant horizon. I do not

know what is going to be the result of that Yellow Terror, but our

government has had no hand in evoking it, and let's be happy in that

and proud of it.

We have nursed free silver, we watched by its cradle; we have done

the best we could to raise that child, but those pestiferous

Republicans have- well, they keep giving it the measles every chance

they get, and we never shall raise that child. Well, that's no matter-

there's plenty of other things to do, and we must think of something

else. Well, we have tried a President four years, criticised him and

found fault with him the whole time, and turned around a day or two

ago with votes enough to spare to elect another. O consistency!

consistency! thy name- I don't know what thy name is- Thompson will

do- any name will do- but you see there is the fact, there is the

consistency. Then we have tried for governor an illustrious Rough

Rider, and we liked him so much in that great office that now we

have made him Vice-President- not in order that that office shall give

him distinction, but that he may confer distinction upon that

office. And it's needed, too- it's needed. And now, for a while

anyway, we shall not be stammering and embarrassed when a stranger

asks us, "What is the name of the Vice-President?" This one is

known; this one is pretty well known, pretty widely known, and in some

quarters favorably. I am not accustomed to dealing in these fulsome

compliments, and I am probably overdoing it a little; but- well, my

old affectionate admiration for Governor Roosevelt has probably

betrayed me into the complimentary excess; but I know him, and you

know him; and if you give him rope enough- I mean if- oh yes, he

will justify that compliment; leave it just as it is. And now we

have put in his place Mr. Odell, another Rough Rider, I suppose; all

the fat things go to that profession now. Why, I could have been a

Rough Rider myself if I had known that this political Klondike was

going to open up, and I would have been a Rough Rider if I could

have gone to war on an automobile- but not on a horse! No, I know

the horse too well; I have known the horse in war and in peace, and

there is no place where a horse is comfortable. The horse has too many

caprices, and he is too much given to initiative. He invents too

many new ideas. No, I don't want anything to do with a horse.

And then we have taken Chauncey Depew out of a useful and active

life and made him a Senator- embalmed him, corked him up. And I am not

grieving. That man has said many a true thing about me in his time,

and I always said something would happen to him. Look at that

[pointing to Mr. Depew] gilded mummy! He has made my life a sorrow

to me at many a banquet on both sides of the ocean, and now he has got

it. Perish the hand that pulls that cork!

All these things have happened, all these things have come to

pass, while I have been away, and it just shows how little a Mugwump

can be missed in a cold, unfeeling world, even when he is the last one

that is left- a GRAND OLD PARTY all by himself. And there is another

thing that has happened, perhaps the most imposing event of them

all: the institution called the Daughters of the Crown- the

Daughters of the Royal Crown- has established itself and gone into

business. Now, there's an American idea for you; there's an idea

born of God knows what kind of specialized insanity, but not softening

of the brain- you cannot soften a thing that doesn't exist- the

Daughters of the Royal Crown! Nobody eligible but American descendants

of Charles II. Dear me, how the fancy product of that old harem

still holds out!

Well, I am truly glad to foregather with you again, and partake of

the bread and salt of this hospitable house once more. Seven years

ago, when I was your guest here, when I was old and despondent, you

gave me the grip and the word that lift a man up and make him glad

to be alive; and now I come back from my exile young again, fresh

and alive, and ready to begin life once more, and your welcome puts

the finishing touch .upon my restored youth and makes it real to me,

and not a gracious dream that must vanish with the morning. I thank

you.

AN UNDELIVERED SPEECH.

The steamship St. Paul was to have been launched from Cramp's

shipyard in Philadelphia on March 25, 1895. After the launching a

luncheon was to have been given, at which Mr. Clemens was to make a

speech. Just before the final word was given a reporter asked Mr.

Clemens for a copy of his speech to be delivered at the luncheon. To

facilitate the work of the reporter he loaned him a typewritten copy

of the speech. It happened, however, that when the blocks were knocked

away the big ship refused to budge, and no amount of labor could

move her an inch. She had stuck fast upon the ways. As a result, the

launching was postponed for a week or two; but in the mean time Mr.

Clemens had gone to Europe. Years after a reporter called on Mr.

Clemens and submitted the manuscript of the speech, which was as

follows:

DAY after to-morrow I sail for England in a ship of this line, the

Paris. It will be my fourteenth crossing in three years and a half.

Therefore, my presence here, as you see, is quite natural, quite

commercial. I am interested in ships. They interest me more now than

hotels do. When a new ship is launched I feel a desire to go and see

if she will be good quarters for me to live in, particularly if she

belongs to this line, for it is by this line that I have done most

of my ferrying.

People wonder why I go so much. Well, I go partly for my health,

partly to familiarize myself with the road. I have gone over the

same road so many times now that I know all the whales that belong

along the route, and latterly it is an embarrassment to me to meet

them, for they do not look glad to see me, but annoyed, and they

seem to say: "Here is this old derelict again."

Earlier in life this would have pained me and made me ashamed, but I

am older now, and when I am behaving myself, and doing right, I do not

care for a whale's opinion about me. When we are young we generally

estimate an opinion by the size of the person that holds it, but later

we find that that is an uncertain rule, for we realize that there

are times when a hornet's opinion disturbs us more than an emperor's.

I do not mean that I care nothing at all for a whale's opinion,

for that would be going to too great a length. Of course, it is better

to have the good opinion of a whale than his disapproval; but my

position is that if you cannot have a whale's good opinion, except

at some sacrifice of principle or personal dignity, it is better to

try to live without it. That is my idea about whales.

Yes, I have gone over that same route so often that I know my way

without a compass, just by the waves. I know all the large waves and a

good many of the small ones. Also the sunsets. I know every sunset and

where it belongs just by its color. Necessarily, then, I do not make

the passage now for scenery. That is all gone by.

What I prize most is safety, and in the second place swift transit

and handiness. These are best furnished by the American line, whose

watertight compartments have no passage through them, no doors to be

left open, and consequently no way for water to get from one of them

to another in time of collision. If you nullify the peril which

collisions threaten you with, you nullify the only very serious

peril which attends voyages in the great liners of our day, and

makes voyaging safer than staying at home.

When the Paris was half-torn to pieces some years ago, enough of the

Atlantic ebbed and flowed through one end of her, during her long

agony, to sink the fleets of the world if distributed among them;

but she floated in perfect safety, and no life was lost. In time of

collision the rock of Gibraltar is not safer than the Paris and

other great ships of this line. This seems to be the only great line

in the world that takes a passenger from metropolis to metropolis

without the intervention of tugs and barges or bridges- takes him

through without breaking bulk, so to speak.

On the English side he lands at a dock; on the dock a special

train is waiting; in an hour and three-quarters he is in London.

Nothing could be handier. If your journey were from a sand-pit on

our side to a lighthouse on the other, you could make it quicker by

other lines, but that is not the case. The journey is from the city of

New York to the city of London, and no line can do that journey

quicker than this one, nor anywhere near as conveniently and

handily. And when the passenger lands on our side he lands on the

American side of the river, not in the provinces. As a very learned

man said on the last voyage (he is head quartermaster of the New

York land garboard streak of the middle watch): "When we land a

passenger on the American side there's nothing betwix him and his

hotel but hell and the hackman."

I am glad, with you and the nation, to welcome the new ship. She

is another pride, another consolation, for a great country whose

mighty fleets have all vanished, and which has almost forgotten what

it is to fly its flag to sea. I am not sure as to which St. Paul she

is named for. Some think it is the one that is on the upper

Mississippi, but the head quartermaster told me it was the one that

killed Goliath. But it is not important. No matter which it is, let us

give her hearty welcome and godspeed.

SIXTY-SEVENTH BIRTHDAY.

AT THE METROPOLITAN CLUB, NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 28, 1902.

Address at a dinner given in honor of Mr. Clemens by Colonel Harvey,

President of Harper & Brothers.

I THINK I ought to be allowed to talk as long as I want to, for

the reason that I have cancelled all my winter's engagements of

every kind, for good and sufficient reasons, and am making no new

engagements for this winter, and, therefore, this is the only chance I

shall have to disembowel my skull for a year- close the mouth in

that portrait for a year. I want to offer thanks and homage to the

chairman for this innovation which he has introduced here, which is an

improvement, as I consider it, on the old-fashioned style of

conducting occasions like this. That was bad- that was a bad, bad, bad

arrangement. Under that old custom the chairman got up and made a

speech, he introduced the prisoner at the bar, and covered him all

over with compliments, nothing but compliments, not a thing but

compliments, never a slur, and sat down and left that man to get up

and talk without a text. You cannot talk on compliments; that is not a

text. No modest person, and I was born one, can talk on compliments. A

man gets up and is filled to the eyes with happy emotions, but his

tongue is tied; he has nothing to say; he is in the condition of

Doctor Rice's friend who came home drunk and explained it to his wife,

and his wife said to him, "John, when you have drunk all the whiskey

you want, you ought to ask for sarsaparilla." He said, "Yes, but

when I have drunk all the whiskey I want I can't say sarsaparilla."

And so I think it is much better to leave a man unmolested until the

testimony and pleadings are all in. Otherwise he is dumb- he is at the

sarsaparilla stage.

Before I get to the higgledy-piggledy point, as Mr. Howells

suggested I do, I want to thank you, gentlemen, for this very high

honor you are doing me, and I am quite competent to estimate it at its

value. I see around me captains of all the illustrious industries,

most distinguished men; there are more than fifty here, and I

believe I know thirty-nine of them well. I could probably borrow money

from- from the others, anyway. It is a proud thing to me, indeed, to

see such a distinguished company gather here on such an occasion as

this, when there is no foreign prince to be fated- when you have

come here not to do honor to hereditary privilege and ancient lineage,

but to do reverence to mere moral excellence and elemental veracity-

and, dear me, how old it seems to make me! I look around me and I

see three or four persons I have known so many, many years. I have

known Mr. Secretary Hay- John Hay, as the nation and the rest of his

friends love to call him- I have known John Hay and Tom Reed and the

Reverend Twichell close upon thirty-six years. Close upon thirty-six

years I have known those venerable men. I have known Mr. Howells

nearly thirty-four years, and I knew Chauncey Depew before he could

walk straight, and before he learned to tell the truth. Twenty-seven

years ago I heard him make the most noble and eloquent and beautiful

speech that has ever fallen from even his capable lips. Tom Reed

said that my principal defect was inaccuracy of statement. Well,

suppose that that is true. What's the use of telling the truth all the

time? I never tell the truth about Tom Reed- but that is his defect,

truth; he speaks the truth always. Tom Reed has a good heart, and he

has a good intellect, but he hasn't any judgment. Why, when Tom Reed

was invited to lecture to the Ladies' Society for the Procreation or

Procrastination, or something, of morals, I don't know what it was-

advancement, I suppose, of pure morals- he had the immortal

indiscretion to begin by saying that some of us can't be optimists,

but by judiciously utilizing the opportunities that Providence puts in

our way we can all be bigamists. You perceive his limitations.

Anything he has in his mind he states, if he thinks it is true.

Well, that was true, but that was no place to say it- so they fired

him out.

A lot of accounts have been settled here tonight for me; I have held

grudges against some of these people, but they have all been wiped out

by the very handsome compliments that have been paid me. Even Wayne

MacVeagh- I have had a grudge against him many years. The first time I

saw Wayne MacVeagh was at a private dinner-party at Charles A. Dana's,

and when I got there he was clattering along, and I tried to get a

word in here and there; but you know what Wayne MacVeagh is when he is

started, and I could not get in five words to his one- or one word

to his five. I struggled along and struggled along, and- well, I

wanted to tell and I was trying to tell a dream I had had the night

before, and it was a remarkable dream, a dream worth people's while to

listen to, a dream recounting Sam Jones the revivalist's reception

in heaven. I was on a train, and was approaching the celestial

way-station- I had a through ticket- and I noticed a man sitting

alongside of me asleep, and he had his ticket in his hat. He was the

remains of the Archbishop of Canterbury; I recognized him by his

photograph. I had nothing against him, so I took his ticket and let

him have mine. He didn't object- he wasn't in a condition to object-

and presently when the train stopped at the heavenly station- well,

I got off, and he went on by request- but there they all were, the

angels, you know, millions of them, every one with a torch; they had

arranged for a torch-light procession; they were expecting the

Archbishop, and when I got off they started to raise a shout, but it

didn't materialize. I don't know whether they were disappointed. I

suppose they had a lot of superstitious ideas about the Archbishop and

what he should look like, and I didn't fill the bill, and I was trying

to explain to Saint Peter, and was doing it in the German tongue,

because I didn't want to be too explicit. Well, I found it was no use,

I couldn't get along, for Wayne MacVeagh was occupying the whole

place, and I said to Mr. Dana, "What is the matter with that man?

Who is that man with the long tongue? What's the trouble with him,

that long, lank cadaver, old oil-derrick out of a job- who is that?"

"Well, now," Mr. Dana said, "you don't want to meddle with him; you

had better keep quiet; just keep quiet, because that's a bad man.

Talk! He was born to talk. Don't let him get out with you; he'll

skin you." I said, "I have been skinned, skinned, and skinned for

years, there is nothing left." He said, "Oh, you'll find there is;

that man is the very seed and inspiration of that proverb which

says, 'No matter how close you skin an onion, a clever man can

always peel it again.'" Well, I reflected and I quieted down. That

would never occur to Tom Reed. He's got no discretion. Well,

MacVeagh is just the same man; he hasn't changed a bit in all those

years; he has been peeling Mr. Mitchell lately. That's the kind of man

he is.

Mr. Howells- that poem of his is admirable; that's the way to

treat a person. Howells has a peculiar gift for seeing the merits of

people, and he has always exhibited them in my favor. Howells has

never written anything about me that I couldn't read six or seven

times a day; he is always just and always fair; he has written more

appreciatively of me than any one in this world, and published it in

the North American Review. He did me the justice to say that my

intentions- he italicized that- that my intentions were always good,

that I wounded people's conventions rather than their convictions.

Now, I wouldn't want anything handsomer than that said of me. I

would rather wait, with anything harsh I might have to say, till the

convictions become conventions. Bangs has traced me all the way

down. He can't find that honest man, but I will look for him in the

looking-glass when I get home. It was intimated by the Colonel that it

is New England that makes New York and builds up this country and

makes it great, overlooking the fact that there's a lot of people here

who came from elsewhere, like John Hay from away out West, and Howells

from Ohio, and St. Clair McKelway and me from Missouri, and we are

doing what we can to build up New York a little- elevate it. Why, when

I was living in that village of Hannibal, Missouri, on the banks of

the Mississippi, and Hay up in the town of Warsaw, also on the banks

of the Mississippi River- it is an emotional bit of the Mississippi,

and when it is low water you have to climb up to it on a ladder, and

when it floods you have to hunt for it with a deep-sea lead- but it is

a great and beautiful country. In that old time it was a paradise

for simplicity- it was a simple, simple life, cheap but comfortable,

and full of sweetness, and there was nothing of this rage of modern

civilization there at all. It was a delectable land. I went out

there last June, and I met in that town of Hannibal a schoolmate of

mine, John Briggs, whom I had not seen for more than fifty years. I

tell you, that was a meeting! That pal whom I had known as a little

boy long ago, and knew now as a stately man three or four inches

over six feet and browned by exposure to many climes, he was back

there to see that old place again. We spent a whole afternoon going

about here and there and yonder, and hunting up the scenes and talking

of the crimes which we had committed so long ago. It was a

heartbreaking delight, full of pathos, laughter, and tears, all

mixed together; and we called the roll of the boys and girls that we

picnicked and sweethearted with so many years ago, and there were

hardly half a dozen of them left; the rest were in their graves; and

we went up there on the summit of that hill, a treasured place in my

memory, the summit of Holiday's Hill, and looked out again over that

magnificent panorama of the Mississippi River, sweeping along league

after league, a level green paradise on one side, and retreating capes

and promontories as far as you could see on the other, fading away

in the soft, rich lights of the remote distance. I recognized then

that I was seeing now the most enchanting river view the planet

could furnish. I never knew it when I was a boy; it took an educated

eye that had travelled over the globe to know and appreciate it; and

John said, "Can you point out the place where Bear Creek used to be

before the railroad came?" I said, "Yes, it ran along yonder." "And

can you point out the swimming-hole?" "Yes, out there." And he said,

"Can you point out the place where we stole the skiff?" Well, I didn't

know which one he meant. Such a wilderness of events had intervened

since that day, more than fifty years ago, it took me more than five

minutes to call back that little incident, and then I did call it

back; it was a white skiff, and we painted it red to allay

suspicion. And the saddest, saddest man came along- a stranger he was-

and he looked that red skiff over so pathetically, and he said: "Well,

if it weren't for the complexion I'd know whose skiff that was." He

said it in that pleading way, you know, that appeals for sympathy

and suggestion; we were full of sympathy for him, but we weren't in

any condition to offer suggestions. I can see him yet as he turned

away with that same sad look on his face and vanished out of history

forever. I wonder what became of that man. I know what became of the

skiff. Well, it was a beautiful life, a lovely life. There was no

crime. Merely little things like pillaging orchards and

watermelon-patches and breaking the Sabbath- we didn't break the

Sabbath often enough to signify- once a week perhaps. But we were good

boys, good Presbyterian boys, all Presbyterian boys, and loyal and all

that; anyway, we were good Presbyterian boys when the weather was

doubtful; when it was fair, we did wander a little from the fold.

Look at John Hay and me. There we were in obscurity, and look

where we are now. Consider the ladder which he has climbed, the

illustrious vocations he has served- and vocations is the right

word; he has in all those vocations acquitted himself with high credit

and honor to his country and to the mother that bore him. Scholar,

soldier, diplomat, poet, historian- now, see where we are. He is

Secretary of State and I am a gentleman. It could not happen in any

other country. Our institutions give men the positions that of right

belong to them through merit; all you men have won your places, not by

heredities, and not by family influence or extraneous help, but only

by the natural gifts God gave you at your birth, made effective by

your own energies; this is the country to live in.

Now, there is one invisible guest here. A part of me is present; the

larger part, the better part, is yonder at her home; that is my

wife, and she has a good many personal friends here, and I think it

won't distress any one of them to know that, although she is going

to be confined to that bed for many months to come from that nervous

prostration, there is not any danger and she is coming along very

well- and I think it quite appropriate that I should speak of her. I

knew her for the first time just in the same year that I first knew

John Hay and Tom Reed and Mr. Twichell- thirty-six years ago- and

she has been the best friend I have ever had, and that is saying a

good deal; she has reared me she and Twichell together- and what I

am I owe to them. Twichell- why, it is such a pleasure to look upon

Twichell's face! For five-and-twenty years I was under the Rev. Mr.

Twichell's tuition, I was in his pastorate, occupying a pew in his

church, and held him in due reverence. That man is full of all the

graces that go to make a person companionable and beloved; and

wherever Twichell goes to start a church the people flock there to buy

the land; they find real estate goes up all around the spot, and the

envious and the thoughtful always try to get Twichell to move to their

neighborhood and start a church; and wherever you see him go you can

go and buy land there with confidence, feeling sure that there will be

a double price for you before very long. I am not saying this to

flatter Mr. Twichell; it is the fact. Many and many a time I have

attended the annual sale in his church, and bought up all the pews

on a margin- and it would have been better for me spiritually and

financially if I had stayed under his wing.

I have tried to do good in this world, and it is marvellous in how

many different ways I have done good, and it is comfortable to

reflect- now, there's Mr. Rogers- just out of the affection I bear

that man many a time I have given him points in finance that he had

never thought of- and if he could lay aside envy, prejudice, and

superstition, and utilize those ideas in his business, it would make a

difference in his bank account.

Well, I like the poetry. I like all the speeches and the poetry,

too. I liked Doctor Van Dyke's poem. I wish I could return thanks in

proper measure to you, gentlemen, who have spoken and violated your

feelings to pay me compliments; some were merited and some you

overlooked, it is true; and Colonel Harvey did slander every one of

you, and put things into my mouth that I never said, never thought

of at all.

And now, my wife and I, out of our single heart, return you our

deepest and most grateful thanks, and- yesterday was her birthday.

TO THE WHITEFRIARS.

ADDRESS AT THE DINNER GIVEN BY THE WHITEFRIARS

CLUB IN HONOR OF MR. CLEMENS,

LONDON, JUNE 20, 1899.

The Whitefriars Club was founded by Dr. Samuel Johnson, and Mr.

Clemens was made an honorary member in 1874. The members are

representative of literary and journalistic London. The toast of

"Our Guest" was proposed by Louis F. Austin, of the Illustrated London

News, and in the course of some humorous remarks he referred to the

vow and to the imaginary woes of the "Friars," as the members of the

club style themselves.

MR. CHAIRMAN AND BRETHREN OF THE VOW- in whatever the vow is; for

although I have been a member of this club for five-and-twenty

years, I don't know any more about what that vow is than Mr. Austin

seems to. But whatever the vow is, I don't care what it is. I have

made a thousand vows.

There is no pleasure comparable to making a vow in the presence of

one who appreciates that vow, in the presence of men who honor and

appreciate you for making the vow, and men who admire you for making

the vow.

There is only one pleasure higher than that, and that is to get

outside and break the vow. A vow is always a pledge of some kind or

other for the protection of your own morals and principles or somebody

else's, and generally, by the irony of fate, it is for the

protection of your own morals.

Hence we have pledges that make us eschew tobacco or wine, and while

you are taking the pledge there is a holy influence about that makes

you feel you are reformed, and that you can never be so happy again in

this world until- you get outside and take a drink.

I had forgotten that I was a member of this club- it is so long ago.

But now I remember that I was here five-and-twenty years ago, and that

I was then at a dinner of the Whitefriars Club, and it was in those

old days when you had just made two great finds. All London was

talking about nothing else than that they had found Livingstone, and

that the lost Sir Roger Tichborne had been found- and they were trying

him for it.

And at the dinner, Chairman- (I do not know who he was)- failed to

come to time. The gentleman who had been appointed to pay me the

customary compliments and to introduce me forgot the compliments,

and did not know what they were.

And George Augustus Sala came in at the last moment, just when I was

about to go without compliments altogether. And that man was a

gifted man. They just called on him instantaneously, while he was

going to sit down, to introduce the stranger, and Sala made one of

those marvellous speeches which he was capable of making. I think no

man talked so fast as Sala did. One did not need wine while he was

making a speech. The rapidity of his utterance made a man drunk in a

minute. An incomparable speech was that, an impromptu speech, and an

impromptu speech is a seldom thing, and he did it so well.

He went into the whole history of the United States, and made it

entirely new to me. He filled it with episodes and incidents that

Washington never heard of, and he did it so convincingly that although

I knew none of it had happened, from that day to this I do not know

any history but Sala's.

I do not know anything so sad as a dinner where you are going to get

up and say something by-and-by, and you do not know what it is. You

sit and wonder and wonder what the gentleman is going to say who is

going to introduce you. You know that if he says something severe,

that if he will deride you, or traduce you, or do anything of that

kind, he will furnish you with a text, because anybody can get up

and talk against that.

Anybody can get up and straighten out his character. But when a

gentleman gets up and merely tells the truth about you, what can you

do?

Mr. Austin has done well. He has supplied so many texts that I

will have to drop out a lot of them, and that is about as difficult as

when you do not have any text at all. Now, he made a beautiful and

smooth speech without any difficulty at all, and I could have done

that if I had gone on with the schooling with which I began. I see

here a gentleman on my left who was my master in the art of oratory

more than twenty-five years ago.

When I look upon the inspiring face of Mr. Depew, it carries me a

long way back. An old and valued friend of mine is he, and I saw his

career as it came along, and it has reached pretty well up to now,

when he, by another miscarriage of justice, is a United States

Senator. But those were delightful days when I was taking lessons in

oratory.

My other master- the Ambassador- is not here yet. Under those two

gentlemen I learned to make after-dinner speeches, and it was

charming.

You know the New England dinner is the great occasion on the other

side of the water. It is held every year to celebrate the landing of

the Pilgrims. Those Pilgrims were a lot of people who were not

needed in England, and you know they had great rivalry, and they

were persuaded to go elsewhere, and they chartered a ship called

Mayflower and set sail, and I have heard it said that they pumped

the Atlantic Ocean through that ship sixteen times.

They fell in over there with the Dutch from Rotterdam, Amsterdam,

and a lot of other places with profane names, and it is from that gang

that Mr. Depew is descended.

On the other hand, Mr. Choate is descended from those Puritans who

landed on a bitter night in December. Every year those people used

to meet at a great banquet in New York, and those masters of mind in

oratory had to make speeches. It was Doctor Depew's business to get up

there and apologize for the Dutch, and Mr. Choate had to get up

later and explain the crimes of the Puritans, and grand, beautiful

times we used to have.

It is curious that after that long lapse of time I meet the

Whitefriars again, some looking as young and fresh as in the old days,

others showing a certain amount of wear and tear, and here, after

all this time, I find one of the masters of oratory and the others

named in the list.

And here we three meet again as exiles on one pretext or another,

and you will notice that while we are absent there is a pleasing

tranquillity in America- a building up of public confidence. We are

doing the best we can for our country. I think we have spent our lives

in serving our country, and we never serve it to greater advantage

than when we get out of it.

But impromptu speaking- that is what I was trying to learn. That

is a difficult thing. I used to do it in this way. I used to begin

about a week ahead, and write out my impromptu speech and get it by

heart. Then I brought it to the New England dinner printed on a

piece of paper in my pocket, so that I could pass it to the

reporters all cut and dried, and in order to do an impromptu speech as

it should be done you have to indicate the places for pauses and

hesitations. I put them all in it. And then you want the applause in

the right places.

When I got to the place where it should come in, if it did not

come in I did not care, but I had it marked in the paper. And these

masters of mind used to wonder why it was my speech came out in the

morning in the first person, while theirs went through the butchery of

synopsis.

I do that kind of speech (I mean an offhand speech), and do it well,

and make no mistake in such a way to deceive the audience completely

and make that audience believe it is an impromptu speech- that is art.

I was frightened out of it at last by an experience of Doctor Hayes.

He was a sort of Nansen of that day. He had been to the North Pole,

and it made him celebrated. He had even seen the polar bear climb

the pole.

He had made one of those magnificent voyages such as Nansen made,

and in those days when a man did anything which greatly

distinguished him for the moment he had to come on to the lecture

platform and tell all about it.

Doctor Hayes was a great, magnificent creature like Nansen, superbly

built. He was to appear in Boston. He wrote his lecture out, and it

was his purpose to read it from manuscript; but in an evil hour he

concluded that it would be a good thing to preface it with something

rather handsome, poetical, and beautiful that he could get off by

heart and deliver as if it were the thought of the moment.

He had not had my experience, and could not do that. He came on

the platform, held his manuscript down, and began with a beautiful

piece of oratory. He spoke something like this:

"When a lonely human being, a pigmy in the midst of the architecture

of nature, stands solitary on those icy waters and looks abroad to the

horizon and sees mighty castles and temples of eternal ice raising

up their pinnacles tipped by the pencil of the departing sun-"

Here a man came across the platform and touched him on the shoulder,

and said: "One minute." And then to the audience:

"Is Mrs. John Smith in the house? Her husband has slipped on the ice

and broken his leg."

And you could see the Mrs. John Smiths get up everywhere and drift

out of the house, and it made great gaps everywhere. Then Doctor Hayes

began again: "When a lonely man, a pigmy in the architecture-" The

janitor came in again and shouted: "It is not Mrs. John Smith! It is

Mrs. John Jones!"

Then all the Mrs. Jones got up and left. Once more the speaker

started, and was in the midst of the sentence when he was

interrupted again, and the result was that the lecture was not

delivered. But the lecturer interviewed the janitor afterward in a

private room, and of the fragments of the janitor they took "twelve

basketsful."

Now, I don't want to sit down just in this way. I have been

talking with so much levity that I have said no serious thing, and you

are really no better or wiser, although Robert Buchanan has

suggested that I am a person who deals in wisdom. I have said

nothing which would make you better than when you came here.

I should be sorry to sit down without having said one serious word

which you can carry home and relate to your children and the old

people who are not able to get away.

And this is just a little maxim which has saved me from many a

difficulty and many a disaster, and in times of tribulation and

uncertainty has come to my rescue, as it shall to yours if you observe

it as I do day and night.

I always use it in an emergency, and you can take it home as a

legacy from me, and it is: "When in doubt, tell the truth."

THE ASCOT GOLD CUP.

The news of Mr. Clemens's arrival in England in June, 1907, was

announced in the papers with big headlines. Immediately following

the announcement was the news- also with big headlines- that the Ascot

Gold Cup had been stolen the same day. The combination, MARK TWAIN

ARRIVES- ASCOT CUP STOLEN, amused the public. The Lord Mayor of London

gave a banquet at the Mansion House in honor of Mr. Clemens.

I DO assure you that I am not so dishonest as I look. I have been so

busy trying to rehabilitate my honor about that Ascot Cup that I

have had no time to prepare a speech.

I was not so honest in former days as I am now, but I have always

been reasonably honest. Well, you know how a man is influenced by

his surroundings. Once upon a time I went to a public meeting where

the oratory of a charitable worker so worked on my feelings that, in

common with others, I would have dropped something substantial in

the hat- if it had come round at that moment.

The speaker had the power of putting those vivid pictures before

one. We were all affected. That was the moment for the hat. I would

have put two hundred dollars in. Before he had finished I could have

put in four hundred dollars. I felt I could have filled up a blank

check- with somebody else's name- and dropped it in.

Well, now, another speaker got up, and in fifteen minutes damped

my spirit; and during the speech of the third speaker all my

enthusiasm went away. When at last the hat came round I dropped in ten

cents- and took out twenty-five.

I came over here to get the honorary degree from Oxford, and I would

have encompassed the seven seas for an honor like that- the greatest

honor that has ever fallen to my share. I am grateful to Oxford for

conferring that honor upon me, and I am sure my country appreciates

it, because first and foremost it is an honor to my country.

And now I am going home again across the sea. I am in spirit young

but in the flesh old, so that it is unlikely that when I go away I

shall ever see England again. But I shall go with the recollection

of the generous and kindly welcome I have had.

I suppose I must say "Good-bye." I say it not with my lips only, but

from the heart.

THE SAVAGE CLUB DINNER.

A portrait of Mr. Clemens, signed by all the members of the club

attending the dinner, was presented to him, July 6, 1907, and in

submitting the toast "The Health of Mark Twain" Mr. J. Scott Stokes

recalled the fact that he had read parts of Doctor Clemens's works

to Harold Frederic during Frederic's last illness.

MR. CHAIRMAN AND FELLOW-SAVAGES,- I am very glad indeed to have that

portrait. I think it is the best one that I have ever had, and there

have been opportunities before to get a good photograph. I have sat to

photographers twenty-two times to-day. Those sittings added to those

that have preceded them since I have been in Europe- if we average

at that rate- must have numbered one hundred to two hundred

sittings. Out of all those there ought to be some good photographs.

This is the best I have had, and I am glad to have your honored

names on it. I did not know Harold Frederic personally, but I have

heard a great deal about him, and nothing that was not pleasant and

nothing except such things as lead a man to honor another man and to

love him. I consider that it is a misfortune of mine that I have never

had the luck to meet him, and if any book of mine read to him in his

last hours made those hours easier for him and more comfortable, I

am very glad and proud of that. I call to mind such a case many

years ago of an English authoress, well known in her day, who wrote

such beautiful child tales, touching and lovely in every possible way.

In a little biographical sketch of her I found that her last hours

were spent partly in reading a book of mine, until she was no longer

able to read. That has always remained in my mind, and I have always

cherished it as one of the good things of my life. I had read what she

had written, and had loved her for what she had done.

Stanley apparently carried a book of mine feloniously away to

Africa, and I have not a doubt that it had a noble and uplifting

influence there in the wilds of Africa- because on his previous

journeys he never carried anything to read except Shakespeare and

the Bible. I did not know of that circumstance. I did not know that he

had carried a book of mine. I only noticed that when he came back he

was a reformed man. I knew Stanley very well in those old days.

Stanley was the first man who ever reported a lecture of mine, and

that was in St. Louis. When I was down there the next time to give the

same lecture I was told to give them something fresh, as they had read

that in the papers. I met Stanley here when he came back from that

first expedition of his which closed with the finding of

Livingstone. You remember how he would break out at the meetings of

the British Association, and find fault with what people said, because

Stanley had notions of his own, and could not contain them. They had

to come out or break him up- and so he would go round and address

geographical societies. He was always on the war-path in those days,

and people always had to have Stanley contradicting their geography

for them and improving it. But he always came back and sat drinking

beer with me in the hotel up to two in the morning, and he was then

one of the most civilized human beings that ever was.

I saw in a newspaper this evening a reference to an interview

which appeared in one of the papers the other day, in which the

interviewer said that I characterized Mr. Birrell's speech the other

day at the Pilgrims' Club as "bully." Now, if you will excuse me, I

never use slang to an interviewer or anybody else. That distresses me.

Whatever I said about Mr. Birrell's speech was said in English, as

good English as anybody uses. If I could not describe Mr. Birrell's

delightful speech without using slang I would not describe it at

all. I would close my mouth and keep it closed, much as it would

discomfort me.

Now that comes of interviewing a man in the first person, which is

an altogether wrong way to interview him. It is entirely wrong because

none of you, I, or anybody else, could interview a man- could listen

to a man talking any length of time and then go off and reproduce that

talk in the first person. It can't be done. What results is merely

that the interviewer gives the substance of what is said and puts it

in his own language and puts it in your mouth. It will always be

either better language than you use or worse, and in my case it is

always worse. I have a great respect for the English language. I am

one of its supporters, its promoters, its elevators. I don't degrade

it. A slip of the tongue would be the most that you would get from me.

I have always tried hard and faithfully to improve my English and

never to degrade it. I always try to use the best English to

describe what I think and what I feel, or what I don't feel and what I

don't think.

I am not one of those who in expressing opinions confine

themselves to facts. I don't know anything that mars good literature

so completely as too much truth. Facts contain a deal of poetry, but

you can't use too many of them without damaging your literature. I

love all literature, and as long as I am a doctor of literature- I

have suggested to you for twenty years I have been diligently trying

to improve my own literature, and now, by virtue of the University

of Oxford, I mean to doctor everybody else's.

Now I think I ought to apologize for my clothes. At home I venture

things that I am not permitted by my family to venture in foreign

parts. I was instructed before I left home and ordered to refrain from

white clothes in England. I meant to keep that command fair and clean,

and I would have done it if I had been in the habit of obeying

instructions, but I can't invent a new process in life right away. I

have not had white clothes on since I crossed the ocean until now.

In these three or four weeks I have grown so tired of gray and black

that you have earned my gratitude in permitting me to come as I

have. I wear white clothes in the depth of winter in my home, but I

don't go out in the streets in them. I don't go out to attract too

much attention. I like to attract some, and always I would like to

be dressed so that I may, be more conspicuous than anybody else.

If I had been an ancient Briton, I would not have contented myself

with blue paint, but I would have bankrupted the rainbow. I so enjoy

gay clothes in which women clothe themselves that it always grieves me

when I go to the opera to see that, while women look like a

flower-bed, the men are a few gray stumps among them in their black

evening dress. These are two or three reasons why I wish to wear white

clothes. When I find myself in assemblies like this, with everybody in

black clothes, I know I possess something that is superior to

everybody else's. Clothes are never clean. You don't know whether they

are clean or not, because you can't see.

Here or anywhere you must scour your head every two or three days or

it is full of grit. Your clothes must collect just as much dirt as

your hair. If you wear white clothes you are clean, and your

cleaning bill gets so heavy that you have to take care. I am proud

to say that I can wear a white suit of clothes without a blemish for

three days. If you need any further instruction in the matter of

clothes I shall be glad to give it to you. I hope I have convinced

some of you that it is just as well to wear white clothes as any other

kind. I do not want to boast. I only want to make you understand

that you are not clean.

As to age, the fact that I am nearly seventy-two years old does

not clearly indicate how old I am, because part of every day- it is

with me as with you- you try to describe your age, and you cannot do

it. Sometimes you are only fifteen; sometimes you are twenty-five.

It is very seldom in a day that I am seventy-two years old. I am older

now sometimes than I was when I used to rob orchards; a thing which

I would not do today- if the orchards were watched. I am so glad to be

here to-night. I am so glad to renew with the Savages that now ancient

time when I first sat with a company of this club in London in 1872.

That is a long time ago. But I did stay with the Savages a night in

London long ago, and as I had come into a very strange land, and was

with friends, as I could see, that has always remained in my mind as a

peculiarly blessed evening, since it brought me into contact with

men of my own kind and my own feelings.

I am glad to be here, and to see you all again, because it is very

likely that I shall not see you again. It is easier than I thought

to come across the Atlantic. I have been received, as you know, in the

most delightfully generous way in England ever since I came here. It

keeps me choked up all the time. Everybody is so generous, and they do

seem to give you such a hearty welcome. Nobody in the world, can

appreciate it higher than I do. It did not wait till I got to

London, but when I came ashore at Tilbury the stevedores on the dock

raised the first welcome- a good and hearty welcome from the men who

do the heavy labor in the world, and save you and me having to do

it. They are the men who with their hands build empires and make

them prosper. It is because of them that the others are wealthy and

can live in luxury. They received me with a "Hurrah!" that went to

my heart. They are the men that build civilization, and without them

no civilization can be built. So I came first to the authors and

creators of civilization, and I blessedly end this happy meeting

with the Savages who destroy it.

GENERAL MILES AND THE DOG.

Mr. Clemens was the guest of honor at a dinner given by the Pleiades

Club at the Hotel Brevoort, December 22, 1907- The toastmaster

introduced the guest of the evening with a high tribute to his place

in American literature, saying that he was dear to the hearts of all

Americans.

IT is hard work to make a speech when you have listened to

compliments from the powers in authority. A compliment is a hard

text to preach to. When the chairman introduces me as a person of

merit, and when he says pleasant things about me, I always feel like

answering simply that what he says is true; that it is all right;

that, as far as I am concerned, the things he said can stand as they

are. But you always have to say something, and that is what

frightens me.

I remember out in Sydney once having to respond to some

complimentary toast, and my one desire was to turn in my tracks like

any other worm- and run for it. I was remembering that occasion at a

later date when I had to introduce a speaker. Hoping, then, to spur

his speech by putting him, in joke, on the defensive, I accused him in

my introduction of everything I thought it impossible for him to

have committed. When I finished there was an awful calm. I had been

telling his life history by mistake.

One must keep up one's character. Earn a character first if you can,

and if you can't, then assume one. From the code of morals I have been

following and revising and revising for seventy-two years I remember

one detail. All my life I have been honest- comparatively honest. I

could never use money I had not made honestly- I could only lend it.

Last spring I met General Miles again, and he commented on the

fact that we had known each other thirty years. He said it was strange

that we had not met years before, when we had both been in Washington.

At that point I changed the subject, and I changed it with art. But

the facts are these:

I was then under contract for my Innocents Abroad, but did not

have a cent to live on while I wrote it. So I went to Washington to do

a little journalism. There I met an equally poor friend, William

Davidson, who had not a single vice, unless you call it a vice in a

Scot to love Scotch. Together we devised the first and original

newspaper syndicate, selling two letters a week to twelve newspapers

and getting $1 a letter. That $24 a week would have been enough for

us- if we had not had to support the jug.

But there was a day when we felt that we must have $3 right away- $3

at once. That was how I met the General. It doesn't matter now what we

wanted so much money at one time for, but that Scot and I did

occasionally want it. The Scot sent me out one day to get it. He had a

great belief in Providence, that Scottish friend of mine. He said:

"The Lord will provide."

I had given up trying to find the money lying about, and was in a

hotel lobby in despair, when I saw a beautiful unfriended dog. The dog

saw me, too, and at once we became acquainted. Then General Miles came

in, admired the dog, and asked me to price it. I priced it at $3. He

offered me an opportunity to reconsider the value of the beautiful

animal, but I refused to take more than Providence knew I needed.

The General carried the dog to his room.

Then came in a sweet little middle-aged man, who at once began

looking around the lobby.

"Did you lose a dog?" I asked. He said he had.

"I think I could find it," I volunteered, "for a small sum."

"'How much?'" he asked. And I told him $3. He urged me to accept

more, but I did not wish to outdo Providence. Then I went to the

General's room and asked for the dog back. He was very angry, and

wanted to know why I had sold him a dog that did not belong to me.

"That's a singular question to ask me, sir," I replied. "Didn't

you ask me to sell him? You started it." And he let me have him. I

gave him back his $3 and returned the dog, collect, to its owner. That

second $3 I carried home to the Scot, and we enjoyed it, but the first

$3, the money I got from the General, I would have had to lend.

The General seemed not to remember my part in that adventure, and

I never had the heart to tell him about it.

WHEN IN DOUBT, TELL THE TRUTH.

Mark Twain's speech at the dinner of the "Freundschaft Society,"

March 9, 1906, had as a basis the words of introduction used by

Toastmaster Frank, who, referring to Pudd'nhead Wilson, used the

phrase, "When in doubt, tell the truth."

MR. CHAIRMAN, MR. PUTZEL, AND GENTLEMEN OF THE FREUNDSCHAFT,- That

maxim I did invent, but never expected it to be applied to me. I did

say, "When you are in doubt," but when I am in doubt myself I use more

sagacity.

Mr. Grout suggested that if I have anything to say against Mr.

Putzel, or any criticism of his career or his character, I am the last

person to come out on account of that maxim and tell the truth. That

is altogether a mistake.

I do think it is right for other people to be virtuous so that

they can be happy hereafter, but if I knew every impropriety that even

Mr. Putzel has committed in his life, I would not mention one of them.

My judgment has been maturing for seventy years, and I have got to

that point where I know better than that.

Mr. Putzel stands related to me in a very tender way (through the

tax office), and it does not behoove me to say anything which could by

any possibility militate against that condition of things.

Now, that word- taxes, taxes, taxes! I have heard it to-night. I

have heard it all night. I wish somebody would change that subject;

that is a very sore subject to me.

I was so relieved when Judge Leventritt did find something that

was not taxable- when he said that the commissioner could not tax your

patience. And that comforted me. We've got so much taxation. I don't

know of a single foreign product that enters this country untaxed

except the answer to prayer.

On an occasion like this the proprieties require that you merely pay

compliments to the guest of the occasion, and I am merely here to

pay compliments to the guest of the occasion, not to criticise him

in any way, and I can say only complimentary things to him.

When I went down to the tax office some time ago, for the first time

in New York, I saw Mr. Putzel sitting in the "Seat of Perjury." I

recognized him right away. I warmed to him on the spot. I didn't

know that I had ever seen him before, but just as soon as I saw him

I recognized him. I had met him twenty-five years before, and at

that time had achieved a knowledge of his abilities and something more

than that.

I thought: "Now, this is the man whom I saw twenty-five years

ago." On that occasion I not only went free at his hands, but

carried off something more than that. I hoped it would happen again.

It was twenty-five years ago when I saw a young clerk in Putnam's

book-store. I went in there and asked for George Haven Putnam, and

handed him my card, and then the young man said Mr. Putnam was busy

and I couldn't see him. Well, I had merely called in a social way, and

so it didn't matter.

I was going out when I saw a great big, fat, interesting-looking

book lying there, and I took it up. It was an account of the

invasion of England in the fourteenth century by the Preaching

Friar, and it interested me.

I asked him the price of it, and he said four dollars.

"Well," I said, "what discount do you allow to publishers?"

He said: "Forty per cent. off."

I said: "All right, I am a publisher."

He put down the figure, forty per cent. off, on a card.

Then I said: "What discount do you allow to authors?"

He said: "Forty per cent. off."

"Well," I said, "set me down as an author."

"Now," said I, "what discount do you allow to the clergy?"

He said: "Forty per cent. off."

I said to him that I was only on the road, and that I was studying

for the ministry. I asked him wouldn't he knock off twenty per cent.

for that. He set down the figure, and he never smiled once.

I was working off these humorous brilliancies on him and getting

no return- not a scintillation in his eye, not a spark of

recognition of what I was doing there. I was almost in despair.

I thought I might try him once more, so I said: "Now, I am also a

member of the human race. Will you let me have the ten per cent. off

for that?" He set it down, and never smiled.

Well, I gave it up. I said: "There is my card with my address on it,

but I have not any money with me. Will you please send the bill to

Hartford?" I took up the book and was going away.

He said: "Wait a minute. There is forty cents coming to you."

When I met him in the tax office I thought maybe I could make

something again, but I could not. But I had not any idea I could

when I came, and as it turned out I did get off entirely free.

I put up my hand and made a statement. It gave me a good deal of

pain to do that. I was not used to it. I was born and reared in the

higher circles of Missouri, and there we don't do such things-

didn't in my time, but we have got that little matter settled- got a

sort of tax levied on me.

Then he touched me. Yes, he touched me this time, because he

cried- cried! He was moved to tears to see that I, a virtuous person

only a year before, after immersion for one year- during one year in

the New York morals- had no more conscience than a millionaire.

THE DAY WE CELEBRATE.

ADDRESS AT THE FOURTH-OF-JULY DINNER OF THE

AMERICAN SOCIETY, LONDON, 1899.

I NOTICED in Ambassador Choate's speech that he said: "You may be

Americans or Englishmen, but you cannot be both at the same time." You

responded by applause.

Consider the effect of a short residence here. I find the Ambassador

rises first to speak to a toast, followed by a Senator, and I come

third. What a subtle tribute that to monarchial influence of the

country when you place rank above respectability!

I was born modest, and if I had not been things like this would

force it upon me. I understand it quite well. I am here to see that

between them they do justice to the day we celebrate, and in case they

do not I must do it myself. But I notice they have considered this day

merely from one side- its sentimental, patriotic, poetic side. But

it has another side. It has a commercial, a business side that needs

reforming. It has a historical side.

I do not say "an" historical side, because I am speaking the

American language. I do not see why our cousins should continue to say

"an" hospital, "an" historical fact, "an" horse. It seems to me the

Congress of Women, now in session, should look to it. I think "an"

is having a little too much to do with it. It comes of habit, which

accounts for many things.

Yesterday, for example, I was at a luncheon party. At the end of the

party a great dignitary of the English Established Church went away

half an hour before anybody else and carried off my hat. Now, that was

an innocent act on his part. He went out first, and of course had

the choice of hats. As a rule I try to get out first myself. But I

hold that it was an innocent, unconscious act, due, perhaps, to

heredity. He was thinking about ecclesiastical matters, and when a man

is in that condition of mind he will take anybody's hat. The result

was that the whole afternoon I was under the influence of his clerical

hat and could not tell