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With Illustrations. Handsomely bound in cloth gilt, price zs. 6d. 1. Sunshine and Bain; or, Blanche Cleveland. By A. E.W. 2. Boses and Thorns : or, Five Tales of the Start in Life. 3. Bible Narratives ; or, Scrip- ture Stories. By the Rcv.Frede- rick Calder, M.A 4. Pleasure and Profit; or, Lessons at Home. A liook for Boys and Girls. 5. Country Pleasures; or, The Carterets. By A. E. R. 6. Stories of Courage and Prin- ciple; or, Fit to be a Duchess. By Mrs. Gillespie Smyth. 7. "Who are tbe Happy Ones P or, Home Sketches. By the Author of Quiet Thoughts for Quiet Hours,' &c. 8. The Progress of Character; or, Clift'ethorpe. By H. Power. London : Ward, Lock, & Tyler, Warwick House, Paternoster Row, E.C. BEETON'S HUMOROUS BOOKS. PRICE ONE SHILLING EACH. There is but little call to laud the men who have written the books catalogued below. They have done good work—work that needs no bush; and mankind is under obligations to them for a large sum-total of enjoyment. It will be a long day before we, in England, forget the names of Thomas Hood, Albert Smith, Reach, and the Mayhews ; and from America we hail, as exponents of genuine and special humour, Artemus Ward, J. R. Lowell, Bret Harte, and Charles Dudley Warner, all of whose writings will be found included in the following list,—a various and entertaining company of genial jesters and merry penmen. 27. The Siliad. By the Authors of The Coming K . 28. Marjorie Daw. By T. B. Aldrich. 29. The Jumping' Frog. By Mark Twain. 30. Letters to Punch. By Artemus Ward. 31. Artemus Ward among the Mormons. 32. Naughty Jemima. 33. Eye Openers. By Mark Twain. 34. Practical Jokes. By Mark Twain. 35- Screamers. By Mark Twain. 36. Awful Crammers. By Titus A. Brick. 37. Babies and Ladders. By Emanuel Kink. 38. Holmes' Wit and Humour. 39- Josh Billings. His Say i 40. Dan bury Newsman. By J. M. Bailey. 41. Mystery of Mr. E. Drood. By Orpheus C. Kerr. 42. Shaving Them. By Titus A. Brick. 43. Mr. Brown, on the goings on of Mrs. Brown. 44. Sensation Novels. By Bret Harte. 45- Little Breeches, and other Pieces. By Col. John Hay. 46. Mr. Sprouts. His Opinions 47- Lothaw. By Mr. Benjamin. (Bret Harte.) 48. The Ramsbottom Papers. By Theodorb Hook. London: Ware, Lock, 8c Tyler, Warwick House, Paternoster Row, E.C. 2. Artemus Ward : His Book. 3 Riddles. Illustrated. 4. Burlesques. Illustrated. 5- Charades. Illustrated. 6. The Biglow Papers. J. R. Lowell. 7. Saxe's Poems. J. G. Saxe. 8. Joe Miller's Jest Book. 9. Connubial Bliss. Doughty. 10. Model Men and Model Women. Mayhew. 11. The Flirt and Evening Parties. Albert Smith. 12. The Gent, and Stuck-up People. Albert Smith. 13. The Ballet-Girl and the Idler upon Town. Albert Smith 14- Humbug and Mince Pies. Angus Reach, is- Hearts and Trumps. By Hannay ; and Change for a Shilling. Mayhew. 16. Pusley; or, My Summer in a Garden. Charles D. Warner. 17- Back Log Studies. Chas. D. Warner. 18. Sandy Bar. Bret Harte. 19- Roaring Camp, and other Sketches. Bret Harte. 20. Heathen Chinee. Bret Harte. 21. Hood's Wit and Humour. 22. Hood's Whims. 23. Hood's Oddities. 24. The Innocents Abroad. By Mark Twain. 25. The New Pilgrim's Pro- gress. By Mark Twain. 26. Jokes and Wit of Douglas Jerrold. AMERICAN DROLLERIES; CONTAINING THE JUMPING FROG AND SCREAMERS. BY MARK TWAIN. LONDON: WARD, LOCK, & TYLER, WARWICK HOUSE, PATERNOSTER ROW. BEETON'S HUMOROUS BOOKS. Price One Shilling each. 2. Artemus Ward: His Book. 3. Riddles. Illustrated. 4. Burlesques. Illustrated. 5. Charades. Illustrated. 6. The Biglow Papers. J. R. Lowell. 7. Saxe's Poems. J. G. Saxe. 8. Joe Miller's Jest Book. 9. Connubial Bliss. A. A. Doughty. 10. Model Men and Model Women. Mavhew. 11. Ihe Flirt, and Evening Parties. Albert Smith. 12. The Cent, and Stuck-up People. Albert Smith. 13. The Ballet Girl, and the Idler upon Town. Albert Smith. 14. Humbug and Mince Pies. Angus Reach. 15. Hearts are Trumps. Hannay; and Change for a Shilling. Mayhew. 16. Pusley ; or, My Summer in a Garden. Charles Dudley "Warner. 17. Back Log Studies. Charles Dudley Warner. 18. Sandy Bar. Bret Harte. 19. Roaring Camp, and other Sketches. Bret Harte. 20. The Heathen Chinee and Poetic Pieces. Bret Harte. 21. Flood s Wit and Humour. 22. Hood's Whims, 23. Hood's Oddities. 24. The Innocents Abroad. Mark Twain. 25. The New Pilgrims' Progress. Mark Twain. 26. Jokes and Wit op Douglas Jerrold. 27. The Siliad. The Authors of "The Coming K . 28. Marjorie Daw. T. B. Aldricli. 29. The Jumping Frog. Mark Twain. 3a Letters to Punch. Artemus Ward. 31. Artemus Ward among the Moimons 32. Naughty Jemima. 33. Eye Openers. Mark Twain. 34. Practical Jokes. Mark Twain. 35. Screamers. Mark Twain. 36. Awful Crammers. Titus A. Brick. 37. Babies and Ladders. Emanuel Kink. 38. Holmes' Wit and Humour. 39. Josh Billings : His Sayings. 40. Danbwy Newsman. J. M. Bailey. 41. Mystery of Mr. E. Drood. Orpheus C. Kerr. 42. Shaving Them. Titus A. Brick. 43. Mr. Brown on the Goings on of Mrs. Brown. 44. Sensatio 1 Novels. 45. Little Breeches. 46 Mr. Sprouts : His Opinions. 47. Lothair. 48, Ramsbottom Papers. PUBLISHED BY WARD, LOCK, & TYLER. CONTENTS. PAGE THE JUMPING FEOG OF CALAVERAS COUNTY 15 A COMPLAINT ABOUT CORRESPONDENTS DATED IN SAN FRANCISCO . 23 AURELIA'S UNFORTUNATE YOUNG MAN 23 CURING A COLD 32 ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS 38 THE STORY OF THE BAD LITTLE BOY WHO DIDN'T COME TO GRIEF . 63 AMONG THE FENIANS 57 LITERATURE IN TH I DRY DIGGINGS 58 AN INQUIRY ABOUT INSURANCES 60 AMONG THE SPIRITS 64 AN ITEM WHICH THE EDITOR HIMSELF COULD NOT UNDERSTAND. . 71 THE KILLING OF JULIUS C/ESAR "LOCALIZED 75 "AFTER JENKINS 82 LUCRETIA SMITH'S SOLDIER 84 BRIEF BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF GEORGE WASHINGTON . . .00 A TOUCHING STORY OF GEORGE WASHINGTON'S BOYHOOD . . .93 THE LAUNCH OF TIIE STEAMER "CAPITAL 98 A PAGE FROM A CALIFORNIAN ALMANAC 104 ORIGIN OF ILLUSTRIOUS MEN l'>6 INFORMATION FOR THE MILLION 108 SHORT AND SINGULAR RATIONS 114 HONOURED AS A CURIOSITY IN HONOLULU 117 REMARKABLE INSTANCES OF PRESENCE OF MIND 119 TIIE STEED "OAHU 1-2 A STRANGE DREAM 124 ADVICE FOR GOOD LITTLE GIRLS 131 CONCERNING CHAMBERMAIDS 133 SCREAMERS. pag-i HOLIDAY LITERATURE 9 BAKER'S CAT 14 THR STORY OF THE GOOD LITTLE BOY WHO DID NOT PROSPER . . 20 THE STORY OF THE BAD LITTLE BOY 29 THE SUNDAY SCHOOL g6 POOR HUMAN NATURE 33 WIT—INSPIRATIONS OF THE TWO-YEAR-OLDS 39 DAN MURPHY . ■ 4 SODA WATER .47 HOW I EDITED AN AGRICULTURAL PAPER ONCE 4S* ENIGMA 7.0 AN UNBURLESQUABE THING 61 THE LATE BENJAMIN FRANKLIN .... .... 65 THE UNDERTAKER'S STORY 71 A GENERAL REPLY 76 AN ENTERTAINING ARTICLE 86 "HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF 96 RUNNING FOR GOVERNOR 99 THE POOR EDITOR 100 ' MY WATCH—AN INSTRUCTIVE LITTLE TALE 113 FAVORS FROM CORRESPONDENTS 119 A SANDWICH ISLAND EDITOR 12!) THE PORTRAIT 12 He done it with a zest; Was he a leading of the choir— He done his level best. If he'd a reg'lar task to do, He never took no rest; Or if 'twas off-and-on—the same— He done his level best. If he was preachin' on his beat, He'd tramp from east to west, And north to south—in cold and heat He done his level best. ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS. He'd yank a sinner outen (Hades),* And land him with the blest; Then snatch a prayer 'n waltz in again, And do his lerel best. He'd cuss and sing and howl and pray, And dance and drink and jest, And lie and steal—all one to him— He done his level best. Whate'er this man was sot to do, He done it with a zest; No matter what his contract was, He'd do his level best. Verily, tliis man was gifted with "gorgis abillities, and it is a happiness to me to embalm the memory of their lustre in these columns. If it were not that the poet crop is un- usually large and rank in California this year, I would en- courage you to continue writing, Simon ; but as it is, per- haps it might be too risky in you to enter against so much opposition. "Inquirer wishes to know which is the best brand of smoking tobacco, and how it is manufactured. The most popular—mind, I do not feel at liberty to give an opinion as to the best, and so I simply say the most popular—smok- ing tobacco is the miraculous conglomerate they call Killi- kinick. It is composed of equal 'parts of tobacco stems, chopped straw, "old soldiers, fine shavings, oak-leaves, dog-fennel, corn-shucks, sunflower petals, outside leaves of the cabbage plants, and any refuse of any description what- ever that costs nothing and will burn. After the ingredients are thoroughly mixed together, they are run through a chop- ping machine and soaked in a spittoon. The mass is then * Here I have taken a slight liberty with the original MS. Hades does not make such good metre as the other word of one syllable, but it sounds better. 42 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. sprinkled with fragrant Scotch snuff, packed into various seductive shapes, labelled Genuine Killikinick, from the old original manufactory at Richmond, and sold to con- sumers at a dollar a pound. The choicest brands contain a double portion of old soldiers, and sell at a dollar and a half. Genuine Turkish tobacco contains a treble quantity of old soldiers, and is worth two or three dollars, accord- ing to the amount of service the said old soldiers have previously seen. N.B.—This article is preferred by the Sultan of Turkey; his picture and autograph are on the label. Take a handful of Killikinick, crush it as fine as you can, and examine it closely, and you will find that you can make as good an analysis of it as I have done ; you must not expect to discover any particles ©f genuine tobacco by this rough method, however—to do that it will be neces- sary to take your specimen to the mint and subject it to a fire-assay. A good article of cheap tobacco is now made of chopped pine-straw and Spanish moss ; it contains one old soldier to the ton, and is called Fine Old German To- bacco. Professional Beggar."—No ; you are not obliged to take greenbacks at par. Melton Mowbray,"* Dutch Flat—This correspondent sends a lot of doggerel, and says it has been regarded as very good in Dutch Flat. I give a specimen in verse : The Assyrian came down, lite a wolf on the fold, And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold ; And the sheen of his spears shone like stars on the sea; When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee. * This piece of pleasantry, published in a San Francisco paper, was mistaken by the country journals for seriousness, and many and loud were the denunciations of the ignorance of author and editor, in not knowing that the lines in question were written by Byron.'' answers to correspondents. 43 There, that will do. That may be very good Dutch Flat poetry, but it won't do in the metropolis. It is too smooth and blubbery ; it reads like buttermilk gurgling from a jug. What the people ought to have is something spirited—soise- thing like "Johnny Comes Marching Home. However, keep on practising, and you may succeed yet. There is genius in you, but too much blubber. "Amateur Serenaded."—Yes, I will give you some ad- vice, and do it with a good deal of pleasure. I live in a neighbourhood which is well stocked with young ladies, and consequently I am excruciatingly sensitive upon the subject of serenading. Sometimes I suffer. In the first place, always tune your instruments before you get within three hundred yards of your destination. This will enable you to take your adored unawares, and create a pleasant surprise by launching out at once upon your music. It astonishes the dogs and cats out of their presence of mind, too, so that if you hurry you can get through before they have a chance to recover and interrupt you ; besides, there is nothing cap- tivating in the sounds produced in tuning a lot of melan- choly guitars and fiddles, and neither does a group of able- bodied sentimental young men so engaged look at all dignified. Secondly, clear your throats and do all the coughing you have got to do before you arrive at the seat of war. I have known a young lady to be ruthlessly startled out of h-er slumbers by such a sudden and direful blowing of noses and "h'm-h'm-ing and coughing, that she imagined the house was beleaguered by victims of consumption from the neighbouring hospital. Do you suppose the music was able to make her happy after that 1 Thirdly, don't stand right under the porch and howl, but get out in the middle of the street, or better still, on the other side of it. Distance lends enchantment to the sound. If you have previously transmitted a hint to the lady that she is going to be sere« j 44 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. naded, slie will understand whom the music is for ; besides, if you occupy a neutral position in the middle of the street, maybe all the neighbours round will take stock in your serenade, and invite you to take wine with them. Fourthly, don't sing a whole opera through; enough of a thing's enough. Fifthly, don't sing Lilly Dale.". The profound satisfaction that most of us derive from the reflection that the girl treated of in that song is dead, is constantly marred by the resurrection of the lugubrious ditty itself by your kind of people. Sixthly, don't let your screaming tenor soaz an octave above all the balance of the chorus, and remain there setting everybody's teeth on edge for four blocks around ; and, above all, don't let him sing a solo \ probably there is nothing in the world so suggestive of serene con- tentment and perfect bliss as the spectacle of a calf chewing a dish-rag ; but the nearest approach to it is your reedy tenor, standing apart, in sickly attitude, with head thrown back and eyes uplifted to the moon, piping his distressing solo. Now do not pass lightly over this matter, friend, but ponder it with that seriousness which its importance entitles it to. Seventhly, after you have run all the chickens and dogs and cats in the vicinity distracted, and roused them into a frenzy of crowing, and cackling, and yawling, and caterwauling, put up your dreadful instruments and go home. Eighthly, as soon as you start, gag your tenor— otherwise he will be letting off a screech every now and then, to let the people know he is around. Your amateur tenor is notoriously the most self-conceited of all God's creatures. Tenthly, don't go serenading at all; it is a wicked, unhappy, and seditious practice, and a calamity to aLl souls that are weary and desire to slumber and would be at rest Eleventhly and lastly, the father of the young lady in the next block says that if you come prowling around his neigh- bourhood again, with your infamous scraping and tooting and yell'^g, he will sally forth and deliver you the ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS. 45 hands of the police. As far as I am concerned myself, I would like to have you come, and come often ; but as long as the old man is so prejudiced, perhaps you had better serenade mostly in Oakland, or San Jos6, or around there somewhere. "St. Clair Higgins. Los Angeles.—"My life is a failure ; I have adored, wildly, madly, and she whom I love has turned coldly from me and shed her affections upon another. What would you advise me to do ? You should shed your affections on another, also—or on several, if there are enough to go round. Also, do every- thing you can to make your former flame unhappy. There is an absurd idea disseminated in novels, that the happier a girl is with another man, the happier it makes the old lover she has blighted. Don't allow yourself to bc-ieve any such nonsense as that. The more cause that girl finds to regret that she did not marry you, the more comfortable you will feel over it. It isn't poetical, but it is mighty sound doc- trine. Arithmeticus. Virginia, Nevada.—"If it would take a cannon ball 3J seconds to travel four miles, and 3§ seconds to travel the next four, and 3g to travel the next four, and if its rate of progress continued to diminish in the same ratio, how long would it take it to go fifteen hundred millions of miles ? I don't know. "Ambitious LeamnEK, Oakland.—Yes, you are right— America was not discovered by Alexander Selkirk. "Discarded I.over."—I loved and still love, the beautiful Edwitha Howard, and intended to marry her. Yet, during my temporary absence at Beni for I am not ' up' in the niceties of the language, you understand ; 1 only know enough of it to enable me to ' keep my end up' in an ordinary conversation. 4 LITERATURE IN THE DRY DIGGINGS, LTHOUGIT a resident of San Francisco, I never lieard much about the Art Union Association of that city until I got hold of some old newspapers during my three months' stay in the Big Tree region of Calaveras county. Up there, you know, they read everything, because m most of those little camps they have no libraries, and no books to speak of, except now and then a patent office report or a prayer-book, or literature of that kind, in a general way. that will hang on and last a good while when people are careful with it, like miners; but as for novels, they pass them around and wear them out in a week or two. Now there was Coon, a nice, bald-headed man at the hotel in Angel's Camp, I asked him to lend me a book, one rainy day; he was silent a moment, and a shade of melancholy flitted across his fine face, and then he said : Well, I've got a mighty responsible old Webster Unabridged, what there is left of it, but they started her sloshing around, and sloshing around, and sloshing around the camp before ever I got a chance to read her myself; and next she went to Murphy's, and from there she went to Jackass Gulch, and now she's gone to San Andreas, and I don't expect I'll ever see that book again. But what makes me mad is, that for all they're so handy about keeping her sashshaying around from shanty to shanty, and from camp to camp, none of em's ever got a good word for her. Now Coddington had her a week, and LITERATURE IN THE DRY DIGGINGS. cj ilie was too many for him—lie couldn't spc-11 the words ; ha tackled some of them regular busters, tow'rd the middle, you know, and they throwed him ; next, Dyer, he tried her a jolt, but he couldn't pronounce 'em— Dyer can hunt quail or play seven-up as well as any man, understand, but he can't pronounce worth a cuss ; he used to worry along well enough, though, till he'd flush one of them rattlers with a clatter of syllables as long as a string of sluice-boxes, and then he'd lose his grip and throw up his hand ; and so, finally, Dick Stoker harnessed her, up there at his cabin, and sweated over her, and cussed over her, and rastled with her, for as much as three weeks, night and day, till he got as far as R, and then passed her over to 'Lige Pickerell, and said she was the all-firedest, dryest reading that ever he struck. Well, well, if she's come back from San Andreas, you can get her, and prospect her, but I don't reckon there's a good deal left of her by this time, though time was when she was as likely a book as any in the State, and as hefty, and had an amount of general information in her that was astonish- ing, if any of these cattle had known enough to get it out of her. And ex-corporal Coon proceeded cheerlessly to scout with his brush after the straggling hairs on the rear of his head, and drum them to the front for inspection and roll- call, as was his usual custom before turning in for his regular afternoon nap. AN INQUIRY ABOUT INSURANCES, OMING down from Sacramento the other night, I found on a centre-table in the saloon of the steamboat, a pam- phlet advertisement of an Accident Insurance Company. It interested me a good deal, with its General Accidents, a.nd its Hazardous Tables, and Extra-Hazardous furniture of the same description, and I would like to know something more about it. It is a new thing to me. I want to invest if I come to like it. I want to ask merely a few questions of the man who carries on this Accident shop. For I am an or He publishes this list as accidents he is willing to insure people against: General accidents include the Travelling Risk, and also all forms of Dislocations, Broken Bones, Ruptures, Tendons, Sprains, Concussions, Crushings, Bruisings, Cuts, Stabs, Gunshot Wounds, Poisoned Wounds, Burns and Scalds, Freezing, Bites, Unprovoked Assaults by Burglars, Robbers, or Murderers, the action of Lightning or Sunstroke, the effects of Explosions, Chemicals, Floods, and Earthquakes. Suffocation by Drowning or Choking—where such accidental injury totally disables the person insured from following his usual avocation, or causes death within three months from the time of the happening of the injury. I want to address this party as follows :— Now, Smith—I suppose likely your name is Smith—you phan. AN INQC'IR V ABOUT INSURANCES. 61 don't know me and I don't know you, but I am willing to be friendly. I am acquainted with, a good many of your family —I know John as well as I know any man—and I think we can come to an understanding about your little game without any hard feelings. For instance :— Do you allow the same money on a dog-bite that you do on an earthquake % Do you take special risks for specific accidents 1—that is to say, could I, by getting a policy for dog-bites alone, get it cheaper than if I took a chance in your whole lottery ? And if so, and supposing I got insured against earthquakes, would you charge any more for San Francisco earthquakes than for those that prevail in places that are better anchored down 1 And if I had a policy on earthquakes alone, I couldn't collect on dog-bites, may-be, could 11 If a man had such a policy, and an earthquake shook him up and loosened his joints a good deal, but not enough to in- capacitate him from engaging in pursuits which did not require him to be tight, wouldn't you pay him some of his pension ? I notice you do not mention Biles. How about Biles'? Why do you discriminate between Provoked and Unprovoked Assaults by Burglars 1 If a burglar entered my house at dead of night, and I, in the excitement natural to such an occasion, should forget myself and say something that provoked him, and he should cripple me, wouldn't I get anything 1 But if I provoked him by pure accident, I would have you there, I judge ; because you would have to pay for the Accident part of it, anyhow, seeing that insuring against accidents is just your strong suit, you know. Now, that item about protecting a man against freezing is good. It will procure you ali the custom you want in this country. Because, you understand, the people hereabouts have suffered a good deal from just such climatic drawbacks as that. Why, three years ago, if a man—being a small fish in the matter of money—went over to Washoe and bought into 62 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROGt good silver mine, they would let that man go on and pay assessments till his purse got down to about thirty-two Fahrenheit, and then the big fish would close in on him and freeze him out. And from that day forth you might con- sider that man in the light of a bankrupt community ; and you would have him down to a spot, too. But if you are ready to insure against that sort of thing, and can stand it, you can give Washoe a fair start. You might send me an agency. Business1? Why, Smith, I could get you more business than you could attend to. With such an under- standing as that, the boys would all take a chance. You don't appear to make any particular mention of tak- ing risks on blighted affections. But if you should conclude to do a little business in that line, you might put me down for six or seven chances. I wouldn't mind expense—you might enter it on the extra hazardous. I suppose I would get ahead of you in the long run anyhow, likely. I have been blighted a good deal in my time. But now as to those Effects of Lightning. Suppose the lightning were to strike out at one of your men and miss him, and fetch another party—could that other party come on you for damages ? Or could the relatives of the party thus suddenly snaked out of the bright world in the bloom of his youth come on you in case he was crowded for time? as of course he would be, you know, under such circum ■ stances. You say you have "issued over sixty thousand policies, forty-five of which have proved fatal and been paid for. Now, do you know, Smith, that that looks just a little shaky to me, in a measure ? You appear to have it pretty much all your own way, you see. It is all very well for the lucky forty-five that have died "and been paid for, but how about the other fifty-nine thousand nine hundred and fifty.- five? You have got their money, haven't you? but some- how the, lightning don't seem to strike t-b«m prid they don't AN INQUIRY ABOUT INSURANCES. 63 get any chance at you. Won't their families get fatigued waiting for their dividends 1 Don't your customers drop off rather slow, so to speak 1 You will ruin yourself publishing such damaging state- ments as that, Smith. I tell you as a friend. If you had said that the fifty-nine thousand nine hundred and fifty-five died, and that forty-five lived, you would have issued about four tons of policies the next week. But people are not going to get insured, when you take so much pains to prove that there is such precious little use in it. Good-bye, Smith I AMONG THE SPIRITS, THERE was a seance in town a few nights since. As I was making for it, in company with the reporter of an evening paper, he said he had seen a gambler named Gus Graham shot down in a town in Illinois years ago by a mob, and as he was probably the only person in San Francisco who knew of the circumstance, he thought he would give the spirits Graham to chaw on awhile. [N.B.—This young creature is a Democrat, and speaks with the native strength and inelegance of his tribe.] In the course of the show he wrote his old pal's name on a slip of paper, and folded it up tightly and put it in a hat which was passed around, and which already had about five hundred similar documents in it. The pile was dumped on the table, and the medium began to take them up one by one and lay them aside asking, "Is this spirit present1? or this1? or this? About one in fifty would rap, and the person who sent up the name would rise in his place ajid question the defunct. At last a spirit seized the medium's hand and wrote Gus Graham backward. Then the medium went skirmishing through the papers for the corresponding name. And that old sport knew his card by the back. When the medium came to it, after picking up fifty others, he rapped ! A com- mittee-man unfolded the paper, and it was the right one. I sent for it and got it. It was all right. However, I suppose all Democrats are on sociable terms with the devil. The young "lan got up and asked : AMOXG THE STIR ITS. 65 "Did you die in '511 '52? '53 ? '54? Ghost— Eap, rap, rap. Did you die of cholera 1 diarrhoea 1 dysentery 1 dog-bite 1 sinall-pox 1 violent death 1 Eap, rap, rap. Were you hanged 1 drowned 1 stabbed ? shot ? Eap, rap, rap. "Did you die in Mississippi1? Kentucky? New York? Sandwich Islands 1 Texas ? Illinois 1 Eap, rap, rap. In Adams county 1 Madison 1 Eandolph 1 Eap, rap, rap. It was no use trying to catch the departed gambler. He knew his hand, and played it like a major. About this time a couple of Germans stepped forward, an elderly man and a spry young fellow, cocked and primed for a sensation. They wrote some names. Then young Ollendorff said something which sounded like— 1st ein geist hieraus T [Bursts of laughter from the audience.] Three raps— signifying that there was a geist hieraus. Yollen sie schriehen 1 [More laughter.] Three raps. Finzig stollen, linsowfterowlickterhairowfterfrowleineru- hackfolderol 1 Incredible as it may seem, the spirit cheerfully answered Yes to that astonishing proposition. The audience grew more and more boisterously mirthful with every fresh question, and they were informed that the performance could not go on in the midst of so much levity. TLey became quiet. The German ghost didn't appear to know anything at all — couldn't answer the simplest questions. Young Ollendorff finally stated some numbers, and tried to get at the time of the split's death ; it appeared to be considerably mixed as 6b MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. to whether it died in 1811 or 1812, which was reasonable enough, as it had been so long ago. At last it wrote 12. Tableau ! Young Ollendorff sprang to his feet in a state of consuming excitement. He exclaimed : "Laties und shentlemen ! I write de name fon a man vot lifs! Speerit-rabbing dells me he ties in yahr eighteen hoondred and dwelf, but he yoos as live and helty as The Medium— Sit down, sir ! Ollendorff— But I vant to Medium— You arc not here to make speeches, sir—sit down ! [Mr. O. had squared himself for an oration.] Mr. 0. — But de speerit cheat! — dere is no such speerit [All this time applause and laughter by turns from the audience.] Medium— Take your seat, sir, and I will explain this matter.'' And she explained. And in that explanation she let off a blast which was so terrific that I half expected to see young Ollendorff shot up through the roof. She said he had come up there with fraud and deceit and cheating in his heart, and a kindred spirit had come from the land of shadows to commune with him ! She was terribly bitter. She said in substance, though not in "words, that perdition was full of just such fellows as Ollendorff, and they were ready on the slightest pretext to rush in and assume anybody's name, and rap, and write, and lie, and swindle with a perfect looseness whenever they could rope in a living affinity like poor Ollen- dorff to communicate with ! [Great applause and laughter.] Ollendorff stood his ground with good pluck, and was going to open his batteries again, when a storm of cries arose all over the house, Get down ! Go on ! Clear out! Speak on—we'll hear you ! Climb down from that platform 1 Stay where you are ! Yamose ! Stick to'your post—say your say! The medium rose up and said if Ollendorff remained, AMONG THE SPIRITS. 67 would not. She recognised no one's right to come there and insult her by practising a deception upon her, and attempt- ing to bring ridicule upon so solemn a thing as her religious belief. The audience then became quiet, and the subjugated Ollendorff retired from the platform. The other German raised a spirit, questioned it at some length in his own language, and said the answers were cor- rect. The medium claimed to be entirely unacquainted with the German language. Just then a gentleman called me to the edge of the plat- form and asked me if I were a Spiritualist. I said I was not. He asked me if I were prejudiced. I said not more than any unbeliever; but I could not believe in a thing which I could not understand, and I had not seen anything yet that I could by any possibility cipher out. He said, then, that he didn't think I was the cause of the diffidence shown by the spirits, but he knew there was an antagonistic influence around that table somewhere; he had noticed it from the first; there was a painful negative current passing to his sensitive organization from that direction constantly. I told him I guessed it was that other fellow ; and I said, Blame a man who was all the time shedding these infernal negative currents! This appeared to satisfy the mind of the inquiring fanatic, and he sat down. I had a very dear friend who, I had heard, had gone to the spirit-land, or perdition, or some of those places, and I desired to know something concerning him. There was something so awful, though, about talking with living, sin- fnl lips to the ghostly dead, that I could hardly bring my- self to rise and speak. But at last I got tremblingly up and said with a low and trembling voice : Is the spirit of John Smith present 1 (You never can depend on these Smiths ; you call for one, and the whole tribe will come clattering out of hell to an. swer vou.) £S MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. Whack i whack ! whack ! whack ! Bless me! I believe all the dead and damned John Smiths between San Francisco and perdition boarded that poor little table at once ! I was considerably set back—stunned, I may say. The audience urged me to go on, however, and 1 said : What did you die of 1 The Smiths answered to every disease and casualty that men can die of. Where did you die V They answered Yes to every locality I could name while my geography held out. Are you happy where you are 1 There was a vigorous and unanimous "No ! from the late Smiths. Is it warm there ? An educated Smith seized the medium's hand and wrote : It's no name for it. Did you leave any Smiths in that place when you came away 1 Dead loads of them ! I fancied I heard the shadowy Smiths chuckle at this feeble joke—the rare joke that there could be live loads of Smiths where all are dead. How many Smiths are present 1 Eighteen millions—the procession now reaches from here to the other side of China. Then there are many Smiths in the kingdom of the lost! "The Prince Apollyon calls all new comers Smith on general principles ; and continues to do so until he is cor- rected, if he chances to be mistaken. What do lost spirits call their drear abode V' They call it the Smithsonian Institute. I got hold of the right Smith at last—the particular Smith I was after—my dear, lost, lamented friend—and learned AMONG THE SPIRITS. 6y that lie died a violent death. I feared as much. He said his wife talked him to death. Poor wretch ! By-and-bye up started another Smith. A gentleman in the audience said that this was his Smith. So he questioned him, and this Smith said he too died by violence. He had been a good deal tangled in his religious belief, and was a sort of a cross between a Universalist and a Unitarian ; has got straightened out and changed his opinions since he left here; said he was perfectly happy. We proceeded to ques- tion this talkative and frolicsome old parson. Among spirits I judge he is the gayest of the gay. He said he had no tan- gible body ; a bullet could pass through him and never make a hole ; rain could pass through him as through vapour, and not discommode him in the least (so I suppose he don't know enough to come in when it rains—or don't care enough); says heaven and hell are simply mental con- ditions ; spirits in the former have happy and contented minds, and those in the latter are torn by remorse of con- science; says as far as he is concerned, he is all right—lie is happy ; would not say whether he was a very good or a very bad man on earth (the shrewd old waterproof nonentity ! I asked the question so that I might average my own chances for his luck in the other world, but he saw my drift); says he has an occupation there—puts in his time teaching and being taught; says there are spheres—grades of perfection —he is making very good progress—has been promoted a sphere or so since his matriculation ; (I said mentally, "Go slow, old man, go slow, you have got all eternity before you, and he replied not;) he don't know how many spheres there are (but I suppose there must be millions, because if a man goes galloping through them at the rate this old Universalist is doing, he will get through an infinitude of them by the time he has been there as long as old Sesostris and those ancient mummies ; and there is no estimating how high he will get in even the infancy of eternity—I am afraid the old ;o MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. man is scouring along rather too fast for the style of his surroundings, and the length of time he has got on his hands); says spirits cannot feel heat or cold (which militates somewhat against all my notions of orthodox damnation— fire and brimstone); says spirits commune with each other by thought—they have no language; says the distinctions of sex are preserved there—and so forth and so on. The old parson wrote and talked for an hour, and showed by his quick, shrewd, intelligent replies, that he had not been sitting up nights in the other world for nothing; he had been prying into everything worth knowing, and finding out everything he possibly could—as he said himself—when he did not understand a thing he hunted up a spirit who could explain it, consequently he is pretty thoroughly posted. And for his accommodating conduct and his uniform cour- tesy to me, I sincerely hope he will continue to progress at his present velocity until he lands on the very roof of the highest sphere of all, and thus achieves perfection. AN ITEM WHICH THE EDITOR HIMSELF COULD NOT UNDERSTAND, esteemed friend, Mr. John William Skae, of Yir- ginia City, walked into the office where we are sub- editor at a late hour last night, with an expression of profound and heartfelt suffering upon his countenance, and sighing heavily, laid the following item reverently upon the desk, and walked slowly out again. He paused a moment at the door, and seemed struggling to command his feelings sufficiently to enable him to speak, and then, nodding his head towards his manuscript, ejaculated in a broken voice, Friend of mine—oh ! how sad and burst into tears. We were so moved at his distress that we did not think to call him back and endeavour to comfort him until he was gone, and it was too late. The paper had already gone to press, but knowing that our friend would consider the publication of this item important, and cherishing the hope that to print it would afford a melancholy satisfaction to his sorrowing heart, we stopped the press at once and inserted it in our columns: Distressing- Accident.—Last evening about 6 o'clock, as Mr. William Schuyler, an old and respectable citizen of South Park, wao leaving his residence to go down town, as has been his usual custom for many years, with the exception only of a short interval in the spring of 1850, during which he was confined to his bed by injuries received in attempting to stop a runaway horse by thoughtlessly placing himself directly in its wake and throwing up his hands and 7 2 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. shouting, wliich if he had done so even a single moment sooner, must inevitably have frightened the animal still more instead of checking its speed, although disastrous enough to himself as it was, and rendered more melancholy and distressing by reason of the presence of his wife's mother, who was there and saw the sad occur- rence, notwithstanding it is at least likely, though not necessarily so, that she should be roconnoitering in another direction when inci- dents occur, not being vivacious and on the look out, as a general thing,tbut even the reverse, as her own mother is said to have stated, who is no more, but died in the full hope of a glorious resurrection, upwards of three years ago, aged 86, being a Christian woman and without guile, as it were, or property, in consequence of the fire of 1819, which destroyed every blasted thing she had in the world. But such is life. Let us all take warning by this solemn occurrence, and let us endeavour so to conduct ourselves that when we come to die we can do it. Let us place our hands upon our hearts, and say with earnestness and sincerity that from this day forth we will beware of the intoxicating bowl.—First Edition, of the Californian. The boss-editor has been in here raising the very mischief, and tearing his hair and kicking the furniture about, and abusing me like a pickpocket. He says that every time he leaves me in charge of the paper for half an hour, I get im- posed upon by the first infant or the first idiot that comes along. And he says that distressing item of Johnny Skae's is nothing but a lot of distressing bosh, and has got no point to it, and no sense in it, and no information in it, and that there was no earthly necessity for stopping the press to publish it. He says every man he meets has insinuated that somebody about The Californian office has gone crazy. How all this comes of being good-hearted. If I had been as unaccommodating and unsympathetic as some people, I would have told Johnny Skae that I wouldn't receive his communication at scuh a late hour, and to go to blazes with it; but no, his snuffing distress touched my heart, and I jumped at the chance of doing something to modify his MR. SKAE'S ITEM. 73 misery. I never read his item to see whether there was anything wrong about it, but hastily wrote the few lines which preceded it, and sent it to the printers. And what has my kindness done for me 1 It has done nothing but bring down upon me a storm of abuse and ornamental blasphemy. Now I will just read that item myself, and see if there is any foundation for all this fuss. And if there is, the author of it shall hear from me. I have read it, and I am bound to admit that it seems a little mixed at a first glance. However, I will peruse it once more. I have read it again, and it does really seem a good deal more mixed than ever. I have read it over five times, but if I can get at the mean- ing of it, I wish I may get my just deserts. It won't bear analysis. There are things about it which I cannot under- stand at all. It don't say whatever became of William Schuyler. It just says enough about him to get one inter- ested in his career, and then drops him. Who is William Schuyler, anyhow, and what part of South Park did he live in, and if he started down town at six o'clock, did he ever get there, and if he did, did anything happen to him 1 Is he the individual that met with the "distressing accident! Considering the elaborate circumstantiality of detail observ- able in the item, it seems to me that it ought to contain more than it does. On the contrary, it is obscu re—and not only obscure, but utterly incomprehensible. Was the break- ing of Mr. Schuyler's leg, fifteen years ago, the distressing accident that plunged Mr. Skae into unspeakable grief, and caused him to come up here at dead of night and stop our press to acquaint the world with the unfortunate circum- 5 74 MARK TWAINS JUMPING FROG. stance? Or did the "distressing accident consist in the destruction of Schuyler's mother-in-law's property in early times ? Or did it consist in the death of that person herself three years ago ? (albeit it does not appear that she died by accident.) In a word, what did that distressing accident consist in 1 What did that drivelling ass of a Schuyler stand in the wake of a runaway horse for, with his shouting and gesticulating, if he wanted to stop him? And how the mischief could he get run over by a horse that had already passed beyond him ? And what are we to take warning by ? and how is this extraordinary chapter of incomprehen- sibilities going to be a lesson t® us ? And above all, what has the intoxicating bowl got to do with it, anyhow ? It is not stated that Schuyler drank, or that his wife drank, or that his mother-in-law drank, or that the horse drank— wherefore, then, the reference to the intoxicating bowl ? It does seem to me that, if Mr. Skae had let the intoxicating bowl alone himself, he never would have got into so much trouble about this infernal imaginary distressing accident. I have read this absurd item over and over again, with all its insin- uating plausibility, until my head swims; but I can make neither head nor tail of it. There certainly seems to have been an accident of some kind or other, but it is impossible to determine what the nature of it was, or who was the sufferer by it. I do not like to do it, but I feel compelled to request that the next time anything happens to one of Mr. Skae's friends, he will append such explanatory notes to his account of it as will enable me to find out what sort of an accident it was and whom it happened to. I had rather all his friends should die than that I should be driven to the verge of lunacy again in trying to cypher out the meaning of another such production as the above. THE KILLING OF JULIOS C£SAR "LOCALIZED. Being the only true and reliable account ever published; taken from, the Roman "Daily Evening Fasces of the date of that tremendous occurrence. TVTOTIIING in the world affords a newspaper reporter so ^ much, satisfaction as gathering np the details of a bloody and mysterious murder, and writing them up with aggravating circumstantiality. He takes a living delight in this labour of love—for such it is to him—especially if he knows that all the other papers have gone to press, and his will be the only one that will contain the dreadful intelli- gence. A feeling of regret has often come over me that I was not reporting in Rome when Caesar was killed—report- ing on an evening paper, and the only one in the city, and getting at least twelve hours ahead of the morning paper boys with this most magnificent item that ever fell to the lot of the craft. Other events have happened as start- ling as this, but none that possessed so peculiarly all the characteristics of the favourite "item of the present day, magnified into grandeur and sublimity by the high rank, fame, and social and political standing of the actors in it. In imagination I have seen myself skirmishing around old Rome, button-holing soldiers, senators, and citizens by turns, and transferring "all the particulars from them to my note-book ; and, better still, arriving at the base of Pom- pey's statue in time to say persuasively to the dying Caesar. 76 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. Oil! come now, you an't so far gone, you know, but what you could stir yourself up a little and tell a fellow just bow this thing happened, if you was a mind to, couldn't you 1— now do ! and get the "straight of it from his own lips, and be envied by the morning paper hounds ! Ah ! if I had lived in those days, I would have written up that item gloatingly, and spiced it with a little moralizing here and plenty of blood there ; and some dark, shuddering mystery ; and praise and pity for some, and misrepresents- tion and abuse for others (who did not patronise the paper), and gory gashes, and notes of warning as to the tendency of the times, and extravagant descriptions of the excitement in the Senate-house and the street, and all that sort of thing. However, as I was not permitted to report Caesar's assas- sination in the regular way, it has at least afforded me rare satisfaction to translate the following able account of it from the original Latin of the Roman Daily Evening Fasces of that date—second edition. Our usually quiet city of Rome was thrown into a state of wild excitement yesterday by the occurrence of one of those bloody affrays which sicken the heart and fill the soul with fear, while they inspire all thinking men with fore- bodings for the future of a city where human life is held so cheaply, and the gravest laws are so openly set at defiance. As the result of that affray, it is our painful duty, as public journalists, to record the death of one of our most esteemed citizens—a man whose name is known wherever this paper circulates, and whose fame it has been our pleasure and our prryijege to extend, and also to protect from the tongue of slander and falsehood, to the best of our poor ability. We refer to Mr. J. Caesar, the Emperor-elect. The facts of the case, as nearly as our reporter could de- termine them from the conflicting statements of eye-wit- nesses, were about as follows :—The affair was an election row, of course. Nine-tenths of the ghastly butcheries tha/ KILLING OF JULIUS CjESAR. 77 disgrace tlie city now-a-days grow out of the bickerings, and jealousies, and animosities engendered by these accursed elections. Rome would be the gainer by it if her very con- stables were elected to serve a century ; for in our expe- rience we have never even been able to choose a dog-pelter without celebrating the event with a dozen knock-downs and a general cramming of the station-house with drunken vagabonds over-night. It is said that when the immense majority for Caesar at the polls in the market was declared the other day, and the crown was offered to that gentleman, even his amazing unselfishness in refusing it three times was not sufficient to save him from the whispered insults of such men as Casca, of the Tenth Ward, and other hirelings of the disappointed candidate, hailing mostly from the Eleventh and Thirteenth and other outside districts, who were overheard speaking ironically and contemptuously of Mr. Caesar's conduct upon that occasion. "We are further informed that there are many among us who think they are justified in believing that the assassina- tion of Julius Caesar was a put-up thing—a cut-and-dried arrangement, hatched by Marcus Brutus and a lot of his hired roughs, and carried out only too faithfully according to the programme. Whether there be good grounds for this suspicion or not, we leave to the people to judge for them- selves, only asking that they will read the following account of the sad occurrence carefully and dispassionately before they render that judgment. "The Senate was already in session, and Caesar was coming down the street towards the capitol, conversing with some personal friends, and followed, as usual, by a large number of citizens. Just as he was passing in front of De- mbsthenes and Thucydides's drug-store, he was observing casually to a gentleman, who, our informant thinks, is a fortune-teller, that the Ides of March were come. The reply was, 4 Yes, they are come, but not gone yet.' At this mo- MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. ment Artemidorus stepped up and passed the time of day, and asked Caesar to read a schedule or a tract, or something of the kind, which he had brought for his perusal. Mr. Decius Brutus also said something about an ' humble suit' which he wanted read. Artemidorus begged that atten- tion might be paid to his first, because it was of personal consequence to Caesar. The latter replied that what con- cerned himself should be read last, or words to that effect. Artemidorus begged and beseeched him to read the paper instantly.* However, Caesar shook him off, and refused to read any petition in the street. He then entered the capitol, and the crowd followed him. About this time the following conversation was over- heard, and we consider that, taken in connexion with the events which succeeded it, it bears an appalling signifi- cance: Mr. Papilius Lena remarked to George W. Cassius (commonly known as the 'Nobby Boy of the Third Ward,') a bruiser in the pay of the Opposition, that he hoped his enterprise to-day might thrive; and when Cassius asked, ' What enterprise V he only closed his left eye temporarily and said with simulated indifference, 'Fare you well,' and sauntered towards Caesar. Marcus Brutus, who is suspected of being the ringleader of the band that killed Caesar, asked what it was that Lena had said. Cassius told him and added in a low tone, ' I fear our purpose is discovered.' Brutus told his wretched accomplice to keep an eye on Lena, and a moment after Cassius urged that lean and hun- gry vagrant, Casca, whose reputation here is none of the best, to be sudden, for he feared prevention. He then turned to Brutus, apparently much excited, and asked what should be done, and swore that either he or Caesar should * Mark that: it is hinted by William Shakspeare, who saw the beginning and the end of the unfortunate affray, that this sche- dule was simply a note discovering to Caesar that a plot was brew- ing to take his life. KILLING OF JULIUS CJESAR. 79 never turn back—he would kill himself first. At this time Caesar was talking to some of the back-country members about the approaching fall elections, and paying little atten- tion to what was going on around him. Billy Trebonius got into conversation with the people's friend and Caesar's— Mark Antony—and under some pretence or other got him away, and Brutus, Decius Casca, Cinna, Metellus Cimber, and others of the gang of infamous desperadoes that infest Borne at present, closed around the doomed Caesar. Then Metellus Cimber knelt down and begged that his brother might be recalled from banishment, but Caesar rebuked him for his fawning, sneaking conduct, and refused to grant his petition. Immediately, at Camber's request, first Brutus and then Cassius begged for the return of the banished Publius ; but Caesar still refused. He said he could not be moved ; that he was as fixed as the North Star, and pro- ceeded to speak in the most complimentary terms of the firmness of that star, and its steady character. Then he said he was like it, and he believed he was the only man in the country that was ; therefore, since he was ' constant' that Cimber should be banished, he was also ' constant' that he should stay banished, and he'd be d—d if he didn't keep him so ! Instantly seizing upon this shallow pretext for a fight, Casca sprang at Caesar and struck him with a dirk, Caesar grabbing him by the arm with his right hand, and launching a blow straight from the shoulder with his left, that sent the reptile bleeding to the earth. He then backed up against Pompey's statue, and squared himself to receive his assailants. Cassius and Cimba and Cinna rushed upon him with their daggers drawn, and the former succeeded in in- flicting a wound upon his body ; but before he could strike again, and before either of the others could strike at all, Caesar stretched the three miscreants at his feet with as many blows of his powerful fist. By this time the Senate 8o MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. was in an indescribable uproar; the throng of citizens in the lobbies had blockaded the doors in their frantic efforts to escape from the building, the sergeant-at-arms and his assistants were struggling with the assassins, venerable sena- tors had cast aside their encumbering robes, and were leap- ing over benches and flying down the aisles in wild confu- sion towards the shelter of the committee-rooms, and a thousand voices were shouting ' Po-lice ! Po-lice !' in discor- dant tones that rose above the frightful din like shrieking winds above the roaring of a tempest. And amid it all, great Csesar stood with his back against the statue, like a lion at bay, and fought his assailants weaponless and hand to hand, with the defiant bearing and the unwavering cou- rage which he had shown before on many a bloody field. Billy Trebonius and Caius Legarius struck him with their daggers and fell, as their brother-conspirators before them had fallen. But at last, when Csesar saw his old friend Brutus step forward, armed with a murderous knife, it is said he seemed utterly overpowered with grief and amaze- ment, and dropping his invincible left arm by his side, he hid his face in the folds of his mantle and received the treacherous blow without an effort to stay the hand that gave it. He only said, ' Et tu, Brute V and fell lifeless on the marble pavement. "We learn that the coat deceased had on when he was killed was the same he wore in his tent on the afternoon of the day he overcame the ISTervii, and that when it was re- moved from the corpse it was found to be cut and gashed in no less than seven different places. There was nothing in the pockets. It will be exhibited at the coroner's inquest, and will be damning proof of the fact of the killing. These latter facts may be relied on, as we get them from Mark Antony, whose position enables him to learn every item of news connected with the one subject of absorbing interest of to-day. THE KILLING OF JULIUS CAESAR. 81 u Later.—While the coroner was summoning a jury, Mark Antony and other friends of the late Cassar got hold of the body, and lugged it off to the Forum, and at last accounts Antony and Brutus were making speeches over it and raising such a row among the people that, as we go to press, the chief of police is satisfied there is going to be a riot, and is taking measures accordingly. "AFTER JENKINS, A GRAND affair of a ball—the Pioneers'—came off at the Occidental some time ago. The following notes of the costumes worn by the belles of the occasion may not be uninteresting to the general reader, and Jenkins may get an idea therefrom: Mrs. W. M. was attired in an elegant p&ti cle foie gras, made expressly for her, and was greatly admired. Miss S. had her hair done up. She was the centre of attraction for the gentlemen and the envy of all the ladies. Miss G. W. was tastefully dressed in a tout ensemble, and was greeted with deafening applause wherever she went. Mrs. C. N. was superbly arrayed in white kid gloves. Her modest and engaging manner accorded well with the unpretending simplicity of her costume, and caused her to be regarded with absorbing interest by every one. The charming Miss M. M. B. appeared in a thrilling waterfall, whose exceeding grace and volume compelled the homage of pioneers and emigrants alike. How beautiful she was! The queenly Mrs. L. R. was attractively attired in her new and beautiful false teeth, and the bon jour effect they naturally produced was heightened by her enchanting and well-sustained smile. The manner of the lady is charmingly pensive and melancholy, and her troops of admirers desired no greater happiness than to get on the scent of her sozodont- AFTER * JENKINS. 83 sweetened sighs, and track her through her sinuous course among the gay and restless multitude. Miss R. P., with that repugnance to ostentation in dress, which is so peculiar to her, was attired in a simple white lace collar, fastened with a neat pearl-button solitaire. The fine contrast between the sparkling vivacity of her natural optic and the steadfast attentiveness of her placid glass eye, was the subject of general and enthusiastic remark. The radiant and sylph-like Mrs. T. wore hoops. She showed to great advantage, and created a sensation wherever she appeared. She was the gayest of the gay. Miss C. L. B. had her fine nose elegantly enamelled, and the easy grace with which she blew it from time to time, marked her as a cultivated and accomplished woman of the world ; its exquisitely modulated tone excited the admira- tion of all who had the happiness to hear it. Being offended with Miss X., and our acquaintance having ceased permanently, I will take this opportunity of observ- ing to her that it is of no use for her to be slopping off to every ball that takes place, and flourishing around with a brass oyster-knife skewered through her waterfall, and smiling her sickly smile through her decayed teeth, with her dismal pug nose in the air. There is no use in it—she don't fool anybody. Everybody knows she is old ; everybody knows she is repaired (you might almost say built) with artificial bones and hair and muscles and things, from the ground up put together scrap by scrap; and everybody knows, also, that all one would have to do would be to pull out her key- pen, and she would go to pieces like a Chinese puzzle. There, now, my faded flower, take that paragraph home with you and amuse yourself with it; and if ever you turn your wart of a nose up at me again, I will sit down and write something that will just make you rise up and howl. LUCRETIA SMITH'S SOLDIER, I AM an ardent admirer of those nice, sickly war stories which have lately been so popular, and for the last three months I have been at work upon one of that cha- racter, which is now completed. It can be relied upon as true in every particular, inasmuch as the facts it contains were compiled from the official records in the War Depart- ment of Washington. It is but just, also, that I should confess that I have drawn largely on Jominis Art of 1 Yar, the Message of the President and Accompanying Documents, and sundry maps and military works, so neces- sary for reference in building a novel like this. To the accommodating Directors of the Overland Telegraph Com- pany I take pleasure in returning my thanks for tendering me the use of their wires at the customary rates. And finally, to all those kind friends who have, by good deeds or encouraging words, assisted me in my labours upon this story of Lucretia Smith's Soldier, during the past three months, and whose names are too numerous for special mention, I take this method of tendering my sincerest gra- titude. CHAPTER I. On a balmy May morning in 1861, the little village of Bluemass, in Massachusetts, lay wrapped in the splendour of the newly-risen sun. Reginald de Whittaker, confiden- LUCRETIA SMITH'S SOLDIER. 85 ti&x and only clerk in the house of Bushrod and Ferguson, general drygoods and grocery dealers and keepers of the post-office, rose from his bunk under the counter, and shook himself. After yawning and stretching comfortably, he sprinkled the floor and proceeded to sweep it. He had only half finished his task, however, when he sat down on a keg of nails and fell into a reverie. This is my last day in this shanty, said he. How it will surprise Lucretia when she hears I am going for a soldier ! How proud she will be, the little darling ! He pictured himself in all manner of warlike situations; the hero of a thousand extraordinary adventures ; the man of rising fame ; the pet of Fortune at last; and beheld himself, finally, returning to his own home, a bronzed and scarred brigadier-general, to cast his honours and his matured and perfect love at the feet of his Lucretia Borgia Smith. At this point a thrill of joy and pride suffused his system ; but he looked down and saw his broom, and blushed. He came toppling down from the clouds he had been soaring among, and was an obscure clerk again, on a salary of two dollars and a half a week. CHAPTER II. At eight o'clock that evening, with a heart palpitating with the proud news he had brought for his beloved, Regi- nald sat in Mr. Smith's parlour awaiting Lucretia's appear- ance. The moment she entered, he sprang to meet her, his face lighted by the torch of love that was blazing in hia head somewhere and shining through, and ejaculated, Mine own 1 as he opened his arms to receive her. Sir f said she, and drew herself up like an offended queen. Poor Reginald was stricken duml with astonishment. 86 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. This chilling demeanour, this angry rebuff, where he had expected the old, tender welcome, banished the gladness from his heart as the cheerful brightness is swept from the landscape when a dark cloud drifts athwart the face of the sun. He stood bewildered a moment, with a sense of gone- ness on him like one who finds himself suddenly overboard upon a midnight sea, and beholds the ship pass into shroud- ing gloom, while the dreadful conviction falls upon his soul that he has not been missed. He tried to speak, but his pallid lips refused their office. At last he murmured : 0 Lucretia! what have I done 1 what is the matter 1 why this cruel coldness1? Don't you love your Reginald any more V' Her lips curled in bitter scorn, and she replied, in mock- ing tones: Don't I love my Reginald any more 1 No, I don't love my Reginald any more ! Go back to your pitiful junk-shop and grab your pitiful yard-stick, and stuff cotton in your ears, so that you can't hear your country shout to you to fall in and shoulder arms. Go ! And then, unheeding the new light that flashed from his eyes, she fled from the room and slammed the door behind her. Only a moment more ! Only a single moment more, he thought, and he could have told her how he had already answered the summons and signed the muster-roll, and all would have been well; his lost bride would have come back to his arms with words of praise and thanksgiving upon her lips. He made a step forward, once, to recall her, but he remembered that he was no longer an effeminate drygoods student, and his warrior soul scorned to sue for quarter. He strode from the place with martial firmness, and never looked behind him. L UCRE TIA SMITH'S SOL DIER. Sy CHAPTER III. When Lucretia awoke next morning, the faint music of fife and the roll of a distant drum came floating upon the soft spring breeze, and as she listened the sounds grew more subdued, and finally passed out of hearing. She lay ab- sorbed in thought for many minutes, and then she sighed, and said: Oh ! if he were only with that band of fellows, how I could love him ! In the course of the day a neighbour dropped in, and when the conversation turned upon the soldiers, the visitor said : Reginald de Whittaker looked rather down-hearted, and didn't shout when he marched along with the other boys this morning. I expect it's owing to you, Miss Loo, though when I met him coming here yesterday evening to tell you he'd enlisted ; he thought you'd like it and be proud of Mercy ! what in the nation's the matter with the girl 1 Nothing, only a sudden misery had fallen like a blight upon her heart, and a deadly pallor telegraphed it to her counttnance. She rose up without a word, and walked with a firm step out of the room ; but once within the sacred seclusion of her own chamber her strong will gave way, and she burst into a flood of passionate tears. Bitterly she up- braided herself for her foolish haste of the night before, and her harsh treatment of her lover at the very moment that he had come to anticipate the proudest wish of her heart, and to tell her that he had enrolled himself under the battle- flag, and was going forth to fight as her soldier. Alas ! other maidens would have soldiers in those glorious fields, and be entitled to the sweet pain of feeling a tender solici- tude for them, but she would be unrepresented. No soldier in all the vast armies would breathe her name as he breasted the crimson tide of war ! She wept again—or rather, she went on weeping where she left off a moment before. In her bitterness of spirit she almost cursed the precipitancy 8S MARK TWAINS JUMPING FROG. that had brought all this sorrow upon her young life. "Drat it! The words were in her bosom, but she locked them there, and closed her lips against their utterance., For weeks she nursed her grief in silence, while the roses faded from her cheeks. And through it all she clung to the hope that some day the old love would bloom again in Re- ginald's heart, and he would write to her; but the long summer days dragged wearily along, and still no letter came. The newspapers teemed with stories of battle and carnage, and eagerly she read them, but always with the same result: the tears welled up and blurred the closing lines—the name she sought was looked for in vain, and the dull aching re- turned to her sinking heart. Letters to the other girls some- times contained brief mention of him, and presented always the same picture of him—a morose, unsmiling, desperate man, always in the thickest of the fight, begrimed with pow- der, and moving calm and unscathed through tempests of shot and shell, as if he bore a charmed life. But at last, in a long list of maimed and killed, poor Lu- cretia read these terrible words, and fell fainting to the floor:—"A. D. Whittaker, private soldier, desperately wounded f CHAPTER IV. On a couch in one of the wajds of a hospital at Washing- ton lay a wounded soldier ; his head was so profusely ban- daged that his features were not visible : but there was no mistaking the happy face of the young girl who sat beside him—it was Luv-ietia Borgia Smith's. She had hunted him out several weeks before, and since that time she had pa- tiently watched by him and nursed him, coming in the morning as soon as the surgeon had finished dressing his wounds, and never leaving him until relieved at nightfall. A ball had shattered his lower jaw, and he could not utter a LUCRETIA SMITH'S SOLDIER. 89 syllable; through all her weary vigils she had never once been blessed with a grateful word from his dear lips ; yet she stood to her post bravely and without a murmur, feeling that when he did get well again she would hear that which would more than reward her for all her devotion. At the hour we have chosen for the opening of this chap- ter, Lucretia was in a tumult of happy excitement; for the surgeon had told her that at last her Whittaker had reco- vered sufficiently to admit of the removal of the bandages from his head, and she was now waiting with feverish impa- tience for the doctor to come and disclose the loved features to her view. At last he came, and Lucretia, with beaming eyes and fluttering heart, bent over the couch with anxious expectancy. One bandage was removed, then another and another, and lo ! the poor wounded face was revealed to the light of day. 0 my own dar What have we here ? What is the matter % Alas. it was the face of a stranger! Poor Lucretia ! With one hand covering her upturned eyes, she staggered back with a moan of anguish. Then a spasm of fury distorted her countenance as she brought her fist down with a crash that made the medicine bottles on the table dance again, and exclaimed : Oh! confound my cats, if I haven't gone and fooled away three mortal weeks here, snuffling and slobbering over the wrong soldier! It was a sad, sad truth. The wretched but innocent and unwitting impostor was R. D., or Richard Dilworthy Whit- taker, of Wisconsin, the soldier of dear little Eugenie Le Mulligan, of that State, and utterly unknown to our unhappy Lucretia B. Smith. Such is life, and the tail of the serpent is over us all. Let us draw the curtain over this melancholy history—for me- lancholy it must still remain, during a season at least, for the real Reginald de Whittaker has uot turned up yet. 6 BRIEF BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF GEORGE WASHINGTON, HIS day, many years ago precisely, George Washington was born. How full of significance the thought! Especially to those among us who have had a similar expe- rience, though subsequently ; and still more especially to the young, who should take him for a model, and faithfully try to be like him, undeterred by the frequency with which the same thing has been attempted by American youths before them and not satisfactorily accomplished. George Washing- ton was the youngest of nine children, eight of whom were the offspring of his uncle and his aunt. As a boy, he gave no promise of the greatness he was one day to achieve. He was ignorant of the commonest accomplishments of youth. He could not even lie. But then he never had any of those precious advantages which are within the reach of the humblest of the boys of the present day. Any boy can lie now. I could lie before I could stand—yet this sort of sprightliness was so common in our family that little notice was taken of it. Young George appears to have had no sagacity whatever. It is related of him that he once chopped down his father's favourite cherry-tree, and then didn't know enough to keep dark about it. He came near going to sea once, as a midshipman; but when his mother represented to him that he must necessarily be absent when he was away from home, and that this must continue to be the case until he got back, the sad truth struck him so forcibly that SKETCH OR GEORGE WASHINGTON. lie ordered his trunk ashore and quietly but firmly refused to serve in the navy and fight the battles of his king so long as the effect of it would be to discommode his mother. The great rule of his life was. that procrastination was the thief of time, and that we should always do unto others somehow. This is the golden rule. Therefore, he would never discom- mode his mother. Young George Washington was actuated in all things by the highest and purest principles of morality, justice, and right. He w.as a model in every way worthy of the emula- tion of youth. Young George was always prompt and faith- ful in the discharge of every duty. It has been said of him, by the historian, that he was always on hand, like a thousand of brick. And well deserved was this compliment. The aggregate of the building material specified might have been largely increased—might have been doubled, even—without doing full justice to these high qualities in the subject of this sketch. Indeed, it would hardly be possible to express in bricks the exceeding promptness and fidelity of young George Washington. His was a soul whose manifold excel- lencies were beyond the ken and computation of mathematics, and bricks are, at the least, but an inadequate vehicle for the conveyance of a comprehension of the moral sublimity of a nature so pure as his. Young George W. was a surveyor in early life—a surveyor of an inland port—a sort of county surveyor ; and under a commission from Governor Dinwiddie, he set out to survey his way four hundred miles through tractless forests, infested with Indians, to procure the liberation of some English prisoners. The historian says the Indians were the most depraved of their species, and did nothing but lay for white men, whom they killed for the sake of robbing them. Con- sidering that white men only travelled through the country at the rate of one a year, they were probably unable to do what might be termed a 'd-office business in their line. ♦>—2 §2 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. They did not rob young G. W. ; one savage made an attempt, but failed ; he fired at the subject of this sketch from behind a tree, but the subject of this sketch immediately snaked him out from behind the tree and took him prisoner. The long journey failed of success ; the French would not give up the prisoners, and Wash, went sadly back home again. A regiment was raised to go and make a rescue, and he took command of it. He caught the French out in the rain, and tackled them with great intrepidity. He defeated them in ten minutes, and their commander handed in his checks. This was the battle of Great Meadows. After this, a good while, George Washington became Com- mander-in-Chief of the American armies, and had an exceed- ingly dusty time of it all through the Eevolution. But every now and then he turned a Jack from the bottom and sur- prised the enemy. He kept up his lick for seven long years, and hazed the British from Harrisburg to Halifax—and America was free ! He served two terms as President, and would have been President yet if he had lived—even so did the people honour the Father of his Country. Let the youth of America take his incomparable character for a model, and try it one jolt, anyhow. Success is possible—let them re- member that—success is possible, though there are chances against it. I could continue this biography with profit to the rising generation, but I shall have to drop the subject at present, because of other matters which must be attended to. A TOUCHING STORY OF GEORGE WASHING- TON'S BOYHOOD, T F it please youi neighbour to break the sacred calm of -*■ night with the snorting of an unholy trombone, it is your duty to put up with his wretched music and your privilege to pity him for the unhappy instinct that moves him to delight in such discordant sounds. I did not always think thus : this consideration for musical amateurs was born of certain disagreeable personal experiences that once followed the development of a like instinct in myself. Now this infidel over the way, who is learning to play on the trombone, and the slowness of whose progress is almost miraculous, goes on with his harrowing work every night, uncursed by me, but tenderly pitied. Ten years ago, for the same offence, I would have set fire to his house. At that time I was a prey to an amateur violinist for two or three weeks, and the sufferings I endured at his hands are incon- ceivable. He played "Old Dan Tucker, and he never played anything else ; but he performed that so badly that he could throw me into fits with it if I were awake, or into a nightmare if I were asleep. As long as he confined himself to Dan Tucker, though, I bore with him and abstained from violence ; but when he projected a fresh outrage, and tried to do Sweet Home, I went over and burnt him out. My next assailant was a wretch who felt a call to play the clarionet. He only played the scale, however, with his distressing instrument, and I let him run the length of hia 94 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. tether also ; but finally, when he branched out into a ghastly tune, I felt my reason deserting me under the exquisite torture, and I sailed forth and burnt him out likewise. During the next two years I burned out an amateur cornet player, a bugler, a bassoon-sophomore, and a barbarian whose talents ran in the base-drum line. I would certainly have scorched this trombone man if he had moved into my neighbourhood in those days. But as I said before, I leave him to his own destruction now, be- cause I have had experience as an amateur myself, and I feel nothing but compassion for that kind of people. Besides I have learned that there lies dormant in the souls of all men a penchant for some particular musical instrument, and- an unsuspected yearning to learn to play on it, that are bound to wake up and demand attention some day. There- fore, you who rail at such as disturb your slumbers with un- successful and demoralizing attempts to subjugate a fiddle, beware ! for sooner or later your own time will come. It is customary and popular to curse these amateurs when they wrench you out of a pleasant dream at night with a pecu- liarly diabolical note ; but seeing that we are all made alike, and must all develope a distorted talent for music in the ful- ness of time, it is not right. I am charitable to my trombone maniac; in a moment of inspiration he fetches a snort, sometimes, that brings me to a sitting posture in bed, broad awake and weltering in a cold perspiration. Perhaps my first thought is, that there has been an earthquake ; perhaps I hear the trombone, and my next thought is, that suicide and the silence of the grave would be a happy release from this nightly agony; perhaps the old instinct comes strong upon me to go after my matches ; but my first cool, collected thought is, that the trombone man's destiny is upon him, and he is working it out in suffering and tribulation ; and I banish from me the unworthy instinct that would prompt me to burn him out. GEORGE WASHINGTON'S BOYHOOD. 9$ After a long immunity from the dreadful insanity that moves a man to become a musician in defiance of the will of God that he should confine himself to sawing wood, I finally fell a victim to the instrument they call the accordeon. At this day I hate that contrivance as fervently as any man can, but at the time I speak of I suddenly acquired a disgusting and idolatrous affection for it. I got one of powerful capac- ity, and learned to play Auld Lang Syne on it. It seems to me, now, that I must have been gifted with a sort of inspira- tion to be enabled, in the state of ignorance in which I then was, to select out of the whole range of musical composition the one solitary tune that sounds vilest and most distressing on the accordeon. I do not suppose there is another tune in the world with which I could have inflicted so much anguish upon my race as I did with that one during my short musical career. After I had been playing Lang Syne about a week, I had the vanity to think I could improve the original melody, and I set about adding some little flourishes and variations to it, but with rather indifferent success, I suppose, as it brought my landlady into my presence with an expression about her of being opposed to such desperate enterprises. Said she, Do you know any other tune but that, Mr. Twain V' I told her, meekly, that I did not. Well, then, said she, "stick to it just as it is ; don't put any variations to it, because it's rough enough on the boarders the way it is now. The fact is, it was something more than simply rough enough on them; it was altogether too rough ; half of them left, and the other half would have followed, but Mrs. Jones saved them by discharging me from the premises. I only stayed one night at my next lodging-house. Mrs. Smith was after me early in the morning. She said, "You can go, sir ; I don't want you here : I have had one of your kind before—a poor lunatic, that clayed the banjo and 9ft MARK TWA/MS JUMPING FROG. danced break-downs, and jarred the glass all out of the windows. You kept me awake all night, and if you was to do it again, I'd take and smash that thing over your head ! I could see that this woman took no delight in music, and I moved to Mrs. Brown's. For three nights in succession I gave my new neighbours Auld Lang Syne, plain and unadulterated, save by a few discords that rather improved the general effect than other- wise. But the very first time I tried the variations the boarders mutinied. I never did find anybody that would stand those variations. I was very well satisfied with my efforts in that house, however, and I left it without any regrets; I drove one boarder as mad as a March hare, and another one tried to scalp his mother. I reflected, though, that if I could only have been allowed to give this latter just one more touch of the variations, he would have finished the old woman. I went to board at Mrs. Murphy's, an Italian lady of many excellent qualities. The very first time I struck up the variations, a haggard, care-worn, cadaverous old man walked into my room and stood beaming upon me a smile of ineff- able happiness. Then he placed his hand upon my head, and looking devoutly aloft, he said with feeling unction, and in a voice trembling with emotion, God bless you, young man ! God bless you ! for you have done that for me which is beyond all praise. For years I have suffered from an in- curable disease, and knowing my doom was sealed and that I must die, I have striven with all my power to resign my- self to my fate, but in vain—the love of life was too strong within me. But Heaven bless you, my benefactor ! for since I heard you play that tune and those variations, I do not want to live any longer—I am entirely resigned—I am will- ing to die—in fact, I am anxious to die. And then the old man fell upon my neck and wept a flood of happy tears. I was surprised at these things ; but I could not help feeling GEORGE WASHINGTONS BOYHOOD. a little proud at what I had done, nor could I help giving the old gentleman a parting blast in the way of some pecu- liarly lacerating variations as he went out at the door. They doubled him up like a jack-knife, and the next time he left his bed of pain and suffering he was all right, in a metallic coffin. My passion for the accordeon finally spent itself and died out, and I was glad when I found myself free from its un- wholesome influence. While the fever was upon me, I was a living, breathing calamity wherever I went, and desolation and disaster followed in my wake. I bred discord in families, I crushed the spirits of the light-hearted, I drove the melan- choly to despair, I hurried invalids to premature dissolution, and I fear I disturbed the very dead in their graves. I did incalculable harm, and inflicted untold suffering upon my race with my execrable music ; and yet to atone for it all, I did but one single blessed act, in making that weary old man willing to go to his long home. Still, I derived some little benefit from that accordeon ; for while I continued to practise on it, I never had to pay any board—landlords were always willing to compromise, on my leaving before the month was up. Now, I had two objects in view in writing the foregoing, one of which was to try and reconcile people to those poor unfortunates who feel that they have a genius for music, and who drive their neighbours crazy every night in trying to develope and cultivate it; and the other was to intro- duce an admirable story about Little George Washington, who could Not Lie, and the Cherry-Tree—or the Apple- Tree—I have forgotten now which, although it was told me only yesterday. And writing such a long and elaborate in- troductory has caused me to forget the story itself i but it was very touching. THE LAUNCH OF THE STEAMER "CAPITAL, I get Mr. Muff Nickerson to go with me and assist in reporting the great Steamboat Launch.—Herelates the interesting His* tory of the Travelling Panoramist. I WAS just starting off to see the launch of the great steamboat Capital, on Saturday week, when I came across Mulph, Mulff, Muff, Mumph, Murph, Mumf, Murf, Mumford, Mulford, Murphy Nickerson—(he is well known to the public by all these names, and I cannot say which is the right one)—bound on the same errand. This was the man I wanted. We set out in a steamer whose decks were crowded with persons of all ages, who were happy in their nervous anxiety to behold the novelty of a steamboat launch. As we approached the spot where the launch was to take plkce, a gentleman from Reese River, by the name of Thompson, came up, with several friends, and said he had been prospecting on the main deck, and had found an ob- ject of interest—a bar. This was all very well, and showed him to be a man of parts ; but like many another man who produces a favourable impression by an introductory re- mark replete with wisdom, he followed it up with a vain and unnecessary question—Would we take a drink? This to me !—Tins to M. M. M. etc. Nickerson ! We proceeded, two by two, arm-in-arm, down to the bar LAUNCH OP THE STEAMER CAPITAL. 99 ia the nether regions, chatting pleasantly, and elbowing the restless multitude. We took pure, cold, health-giving water, with some other things in it, and clinked our glasses together, and were about to drink, when Smith, of Excelsior, drew forth his handkerchief and wiped away a tear; and then, noticing that the action had excited some attention, he explained it by recounting a most affecting incident in the history of a venerated aunt of his—now deceased—and said that, although long years had passed since the touching event he had narrated, he could never take a drink without thinking of the kind-hearted old lady. Mr. Nickerson blew his nose, and said with deep emotion that it gave him a better opinion of human nature to see a man who had had a good aunt, eternally and for ever think- ing about her. This episode reminded Jones, of Mud Springs, of a cir- cumstance which happened many years ago in the home of his childhood, and we held our glasses untouched and rested our elbows on the counter, while we listened with rapt atten- tion to his story. There was something in it about a good-natured stupid man, and this reminded Thompson, of Reese River, of a person of the same kind whom he had once fallen in with while travelling through the back settlements of one of the Atlantic States, and we postponed drinking until he should give us the facts in the case. The hero of the tale had un- intentionally created some consternation at a camp-meeting by one of his innocent asinine freaks ; and this reminded Mr. M. Nickerson of a reminiscence of his temporary sojourn in the interior of Connecticut some months ago; and again our uplifted glasses were stayed on their way to our lips, and we listened attentively to THE ENTERTAINING HISTORY OP THE SCRIPTURAL PAN OR AMIST. [I give the history in Mr. Nickerson's own language.] There was a fellow travelling around, in that country (said 100 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. Mr. Nickerson), with a moral religious show—a sort of a scriptural panorama—and he hired a wooden-headed old slab to play the piano for him. After the first night's perfor- mance, the showman says : My friend, you seem to know pretty much all the tunes there are, and you worry along first-rate. But then didn't you notice that sometimes last night the piece you happened to be playing was a little rough on the proprieties, so to speak didn't seem to jibe with the general gait of the picture that was passing at the time, as it were—was a little foreign to the subject, you know—as if you didn't either trump or follow suit, you understand V' Well, no, the fellow said; he hadn't noticed, but it might be ; he had played along just as it came handy. So they put it up that the simple old dummy was to keep his eye on the panorama after that, and as soon as a stunning picture was reeled out, he was to fit it to a dot with a piece of music that would help the audience get the idea of the subject, and warm them up like a camp-meeting revival. That sort of thing would corral their sympathies, the show- man said. There was a big audience that night—mostly middle-aged and old people who belonged to the church and took a strong interest in Bible matters, and the balance were pretty much young bucks and heifers—they always come out strong on pa- noramas, you know, because it gives them a chance to taste one another's mugs in the dark. Well, the showman began to swell himself up for his lecture, and the old mud-dobber tackled the piano and ran his fingers up and down once or twice to see that she was all right, and the fellows behind the curtain commenced to grind out the panorama. The showman balanced his weight on his right foot, and propped his hands on his hips, and flung his eye over his shoulder at the scenery, and says : Ladies and gentlemen, the painting now before you il- LAUNCH OF THE STEAMER "CAPITAL. 101 lustrates the beautiful and touching parable of the Prodigal Son. Observe the happy expression just breaking over the features of the poor suffering youth—so worn and weary with his long march; note also the ecstacy beaming from the uplifted countenance of the aged father, and the joy that sparkles in the eyes of the excited group of youths and maidens, and seems ready to burst in a welcoming chorus from their lips. The lesson, my friends, is as solemn and instructive as the story is tender and beautiful. The mud-dobber was all ready, and the second the speech was finished he struck up : Oh ! we'll all get blind drunk When Johnny comes marching home I Some of the people giggled, and some groaned a little. The showman couldn't say a word. He looked at the piano- sharp ; but he was all lovely and serene—he didn't know there was anything out of gear. The panorama moved on, and the showman drummed up his grit and started in fresh : "Ladies and gentlemen, the fine picture now unfolding itself to your gaze exhibits one of the most notable events in Bible history—our Saviour and his disciples upon the Sea of Galilee. How grand, how awe-inspiring are the reflections which the subject invokes ! What sublimity of faith is re- vealed to us in this lesson from the sacred writings ! The Saviour rebukes the angry waves, and walks securely upon the bosom of the deep I All round the house they were whispering, Oh ! how lovely! how beautiful! and the orchestra let himself out again : Oh! a life on the ocean wave, And a home on the rolling deep l There was a good deal of honest snickering turned on this 102 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. time, and considerable groaning, and one or two old deacons got up and went out. The showman gritted his teeth and cursed the piano man to himself; but the fellow sat there like a knot on a log, and seemed to think he was doing first- rate. After things got quiet, the showman thought he would make one more stagger at it, anyhow, though his confidence was beginning to get mighty shaky. The super started the panorama to grinding along again, and he says : Ladies and gentlemen, this exquisite painting illustrates the raising of Lazarus from the dead by our Saviour. The subject has been handled with rare ability by the artist, and such touching sweetness and tenderness of expression has he thrown into it, that I have known peculiarly sensitive per- sons to be even affected to tears by looking at it. Observe the half-confused, half-inquiring look, upon the countenance of the awakening Lazarus. Observe, also, the attitude and expression of the Saviour, who takes him gently by the sleeve of his shroud with one hand, while he points with the other towards the distant city. Before anybody could get off an opinion in the case, the innocent old ass at the piano struck up : Come rise up, William Ei-i-ley, And Go along witli me! It was rough on the audience, you bet you. All the solemn old flats got up in a huff to go, and everybody else laughed till the windows rattled. The showman went down and grabbed the orchestra, and shook him up, and says : "That lets you out, you know, you chowderheaded old clam ! Go to the doorkeeper and get your money, and cut your stick ! vamose the ranche ! Ladies and gentlemen, cir- cumstances over which I have no control compel me prema- furely to dismiss LAUNCH OF THE STEAMER CAPITAL. 103 By George ! it was splendid ! Come! all hands ! let's take a drink! It was Phelim O'Flannigan of San Luis Obispo, who in- terrupted. I had not seen him before. What was splendid V' I inquired. "The launch! Our party clinked glasses once more, and drank in respect- ful silence. P.S.—You will excuse me from making a model report of the great launch. I was with Mulf Nicker son, who was going to explain the whole thing to me as clear as a glass but you see, they launched the boat with such indecent haste, that we never got a chance to see it. It was a great pity, because Mulph Nickerson understands launches as well as any man. A PAGE FROM A CALIFORNIAN ALMANAC. T the instance of several friends who feel a boding anxiety to know beforehand what sort of phenomena we may expect the elements to exhibit during the next month or two, and who have lost all confidence in the various patent medicine almanacs, because of the un- accountable reticence of those works concerning the ex- traordinary event of the 8th inst., I have compiled the following almanac expressly for the latitude of San Francisco :— Oct. 17.—Weather hazy; atmosphere murky and dense. An expression of profound melancholy will be observable upon most countenances. Oct. 18.—Slight earthquake. Countenances grow more melancholy. Oct. 19.—Look out for rain. It would be absurd to look in for it. The general depression of spirits increased. Oct. 20.—More weather. Oct. 21.—Some. Oct. 22.—Light winds, perhaps. If they blow, it will be from the east'ard, or the nor'ard, or the west'ard, or the south'ard, or from some general direction approximating more or less to these points of the compass or otherwise. Winds are uncertain—more especially when they blow from whence they cometh and whither they listeth. N.B.—Such is the nature of winds. A PAGE FROM A CALIFORNIAN ALMANAC. 105 Oct. 23.—Mild, balmy earthquakes. Oct. 24.—Shaky. Oct. 25.—Occasional shakes, followed by light showers of bricks and plastering. N.B.—Stand from under ! Oct. 26.—Considerable phenomenal atmospheric foolish- ness. About this time expect more earthquakes; but do not look for them, on account of the bricks. Oct. 27.—Universal despondency, indicative of approach- ing disaster. Abstain from smiling, or indulgence in hu- morous conversation, or exasperating jokes. Oct. 28.—Mic-sry, dismal forebodings, and despair. Be- ware of all light discourse—a joke uttered at this time would produce a popular outbreak, Oct. 29.—Beware ! Oct. 30.—Keep dark ! Oct. 31.—Go slow ! Nov. 1.—Terrific earthquake. This is the great earth- quake month. More stars fall and more worlds are slathered around carelessly and destroyed in November than in any other month of the twelve. Nov. 2.—Spasmodic but exhilarating earthquakes, accom- panied by occasional showers of rain and churches and things. Nov. 3.—Make your will. Nov. 4.—Sell out. Nov. 5.—Select your last words. Those of John Quincy Adams will do, with the addition of a syllable, thus : This is the last of earthquakes. Nov. 6.—Prepare to shed this mortal coil. Nov. 7.—Shed! Nov. 8.—The sun will rise as usual, perhaps; but if he does, he will doubtless be staggered some to find nothing but a large round hols eight thousand miles in diameter in the place where he saw this world serenely spinning the day before. 7 ORIGIN OF ILLUSTRIOUS MEN. JOHN SMITH was the son of his father. He formerly lived in New York and other places, but he has removed to San Francisco now. William Smith was the son of his mother. This party's grandmother is deceased. She was a brick. John Brown was the son of old Brown. The body of the latter lies mouldering in the grave. Edward Brown was the son of old Brown by a particular friend. Henry Jones was the son of a sea-cook. Ed. Jones was a son of a gun. John Jones was a son of temperance. In early life Gabriel Jones was actually a shoemaker. He is a shoemaker yet. Previous to the age of eighty-five, Caleb J ones had never given evidence of extraordinary ability. He has never given any since. Patrick Murphy is said to have been of Irish extraction. James Peterson was the son of a common weaver, who was so miraculously poor that his friends were encouraged to believe that in case the Scriptures were carried out he would inherit the earth. He never got his property. John Davis's father was the son of a soap-boiler, and not a very good soap-boiler at that. John never arrived at maturity—died in child-birth—he and his mother. John Johnson was a blacksmith. He died. It was pub- ORIGIN OF ILLUSTRIOUS MEN. 107 listed in the papers, with a head over it, Deaths. It was, therefore, thought he died to gain notoriety. He has got an aunt living somewhere. Up to the age of thirty-four Hosea Wilkerson never had any home but Home Sweet Home, and even then he had it to sing himself. At one time it was believed that he would have been famous if he became celebrated. He died. He was greatly esteemed for his many virtues. There was not a dry eye in the crowd when they planted him. INFORMATION FOR JHE MILLION, A YOUNG man anxious for information writes to a friend residing in Virginia City, Nevada, as follows:— Springfield, Mo., April 12. Dear Sir : My object in writing to you is to have you give me a full history of Nevada. What is the character of its climate ? What are the productions of the earth ? Is it healthy ? What diseases do they die of mostly ? Do you think it would be advis- able for a man who can make a living in Missouri to emigrate to that part of the country P There are several of us who would emigrate there in the spring if we could ascertain to a certainty that it is a much better country than this. I suppose you know JoelH. Smith? He used to live here; he lives in Nevada now; they say he owns considerable in a mine there. Hoping to hear from you soon, etc., I remain yours truly, WltXTAM The letter was handed into a newspaper office for reply. For the benefit of all who contemplate moving to Nevada, it is perhaps best to publish the correspondence in its entirety:— Dearest William : Pardon my familiarity—but that name touchingly reminds me of the loved and lost, whose name was similar. I have taken the contract to answer your letter, and although we are now strangers, I feel we INFORMATION FOR THE MILLION. 109 shall cease to be so if we ever become acquainted with each other. The thought is worthy of attention, William. I will now respond to your several propositions in the order in which you have fulminated them. Your object in writing is to have me give you a full history of Nevada. The flattering confidence you repose in me, William, is only equalled by the modesty of your request. I could detail the history of Nevada in five hundred pages octavo ; but as you have never done me any harm, I will spare you, though it will be apparent to every- body that I would be justified in taking advantage of you if I were a mind to. However, I will condense. Nevada was discovered many years ago by the Mormons, and was called Carson county. It only became Nevada in 1861, by act of Congress. There is a popular tradition that the Almighty created it; but when you cow to see it, William, you will think differently. Do not let ;Aat discourage you, though. The country looks something like a singed cat, owing to the scarcity of shrubbery, and also resembles that animal in the respect that it has more merits than its personal appearance would seem to indicate. The Grosch brothers found the first silver lead here in 1857. They also founded Silver City, I believe. Signify to your friends, however, that all the mines here do not pay dividends as yet; you may make this statement with the utmost un- yielding inflexibility—it will not be contradicted from this quarter. The [population of this territory is about 35,000, one-half of which number reside in the united cities of Virginia and Gold Hill. However, I will discontinue this history for the present, lest I get you too deeply interested in this distant land, and cause you to neglect your family or your religion. But I will address you again upon the subject next year. In the meantime, allow me to answer your inquiry as to the character of our climate. It has no character to speak of, William, and, alas 1 in no MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. this respect it resembles many, ah! too many chamber- maids in this wretched, wretched world. Sometimes we have the seasons in their regular order, and then again we have winter all the summer, and summer all the winter. Consequently, we have never yet come across an almanac that would just exactly fit this latitude. It is mighty regular about not raining, though, William. It will start in here in November, and rain about four, and sometimes as much as seven days on a stretch; after that you may loan out your umbrella for twelve months, with the serene con- fidence which a Christian feels in four aces. Sometimes the winter begins in November and winds up in June; and sometimes there is a bare suspicion of winter in March and April, and summer all the balance of the year. But as a general thing, William, the climate is good, what there is of it. What are the productions of the earth 1 You mean in Nevada, of course. On our ranches here anything can be raised that can be produced on the fertile fields of Missouri. But ranches are very scattering—as scattering, perhaps, as lawyers in heaven. Nevada, for the most part, is a barren waste of sand, embellished with melancholy sage-brush, and fenced in with snow-clad mountains. But these ghastly features were the salvation of the land, William; for no rightly-constituted American would have ever come here if the place had been easy of access, and none of our pioneers would have stayed after they got here, if they had not felt satisfied that they could not find a smaller chance for making a living anywhere else. Such is man, William, as he crops out in America. Is it healthy 1 Yes, I think it is as healthy here as it is in any part of the West. But never permit a question of that kind to vegetate in your brain, William; because as long as Providence has an eye on you, you will not be likely to die until your time comes. INFORMATION FOR THE MILLION. ill "What diseases do they die of mostly ! Well, they used to die of conical balls and cold steel, mostly, but here lately erysipelas and the intoxicating bowl have got the bulge on those things, as was very justly remarked by Mr. Rising last Sunday. I will observe, for your information, William, that Mr. Rising is our Episcopal minister, and has done as much as any man among us to redeem this com- munity from its pristine state of semi-barbarism. We are afflicted with all the diseases incident to the same latitude in the States, I believe, with one or two added and half a dozen subtracted on account of our superior altitude. However, the. doctors are about as successful here, both in killing and curing, as they are anywhere. How, as to whether it would be advisable for a man who can make a living in Missouri to emigrate to Nevada, I con- fess I am somewhat mixed. If you are not content in your present condition, it naturally follows that you would be entirely satisfied if you could make either more or less than a living. You would exult in the cheerful exhilaration always produced by a change. Well, you can find your opportunity here, where, if you retain your health, and are sober and industrious, you will inevitably make more than a living, and if you don't, you won't. You can rely upon this statement, William. It contemplates any line of business except the selling of tracts. You cannot sell tracts here, William; the people take no interest in tracts; the very best efforts in the tract line—even with pictures on them— have met with no encouragement. Besides, the newspapers have been interfering; a man gets his regular text or so from the Scriptures in his paper, along with the stock sales and the war news, every day now. If you are in the tract business, William, take no chances on Washoe; but you can succeed at anything else here. I suppose you know Joel H. Smith! Well—the fact is —I believe I don't. Now isn't that singular! Isn't it 112 MARK 7WAIN'S JUMPING FROG. singular 1 And he owns considerable in a mine here too. Happy man! Actually owns in a mine here in Nevada Territory, and I never even heard of him. Strange—strange —do you know, William, it is the strangest thing that ever happened to me 1 And then he not only owns in a mine, but owns considerable that is the strangest part about it —how a man could own considerable in a mine in Washoe, and I not know anything about it. He is a lucky dog, though. But I strongly suspect that you have made a mis- take in the name; I am confident you have; you mean John Smith—I know you do ; I know it from the fact that he owns considerable in a mine here, because I sold him the property at a ruinous sacrifice on the very day he arrived here from over the plains. That man will be rich one of these days. I am just as well satisfied of it as I am of any precisely similar instance of the kind that has come under my notice. I said as much to him yesterday, and he said he was satisfied of it also. But he did not say it with that air of triumphant exultation which a heart like mine so delights to behold in one to whom I have endeavoured to be a benefactor in a small way. He looked pensive awhile, but, finally, says he, Do you know, I think I'd a been a rich man long ago if they'd ever found the d—d ledge ? That was my idea about it. I always thought, and I still think, that if they ever do find that ledge, his chances will be better than they are now. I guess Smith will be right one of these centuries if he keeps up his assessments—he is a young man yet. Now, William, I have taken a liking to you, and I would like to sell you considerable in a mine in Washoe. Let me hear from you on the subject. Greenbacks at par is as good a thing as I want. But seriously, William, don't you ever invest in a mining stock which you don't know anything about ; beware of John Smith's experience 1 INFORMATION FOR THE MILLION. 113 You hope to hear from me soon? Very goocL I shall also hope to hear from you soon about that little matter above referred to. Now, William, ponder this epistle well; never mind the sarcasm here and there, and the nonsense, but reflect upon the plain facts set forth, because they are facts, and are meant to be so under- stood and believed. Remember me affectionately to your friends and relations, and especially to your venerable grandmother, with whom I have not the pleasure to be acquainted—but that is of no consequence, you know. I have been in your town many a time, and all the towns of the neighbouring counties—the hotel-keepers will recollect me vividly. Re- member me to them—I bear them no animosity. Yours affectionately SHORT AND SINGULAR RATIONS. AS many will remember the clipper-ship Hornet, of New York, was burned at sea on her passage to San Francisco. The disaster occurred in lat. 2° 20' north, long. 1120 8' west. After being forty-three days adrift on the broad Pacific in open boats, the crew and passengers sue- ceeded in making Hawaii. A tribute to the courage and brave endurance of these men has been paid in a letter detailing their sufferings (the particulars being gathered from their own lips), from which the following excerpt is made :— On Monday, the thirty-eighth day after the disaster, we had nothing left, said the third mate, but a pound and a half of ham—the bone was a good deal the heaviest part of it—and one soup-and-bully tin. These things were divided among the fifteen men, and they ate it—two ounces of food to each man. I do not count the ham-bone, as that was saved for next day. For some time, now, the poor wretches had been cutting their old boots into small pieces and eating them. They would also pound wet rags to a sort of pulp, and eat them. On the thirty-ninth day the ham-bone was divided up into rations, and scraped with knives and eaten. I said, You say the two sick men remained sick all through, and after a while two or three had to be relieved from standing watch; how did you get along without medi- cines ] SHORT AND SINGULAR RA TIONS. 115 The reply was, Oh ! we couldn't have kept them if we'd had them ; if we'd had boxes of pills, or anything like that, we'd have eaten them. It was just as well—we couldn't have kept them, and we couldn't have given them to the sick men alone—we'd have shared them around all alike, I guess. It was said rather in jest, but it was a pretty true jest, no doubt. After apportioning the ham-bone, the captain cut the canvas cover that had been around the ham into fifteen equal pieces, and each man took his portion. This was the last division of food the captain made. Then men broke up the small oaken butter tub, and divided the staves among themselves, and gnawed them up. The shell of a little green turtle was scraped with knives, and eaten to the last shaving. The third mate chewed pieces of boots, and spit them out, but ate nothing except the soft straps of two pairs of boots—ate three on the thirty-ninth day, and saved one for the fortieth. The men seemed to have thought in their own minds of the shipwrecked mariner's last dreadful resort—cannibalism; but they do not appear to have conversed about it. They only thought of the casting lots and killing one of their number as a possibility; but even when they were eating rags, and bone, and boots, and shell, and hard oak wood, they seem to have still' had a notion that it was remote. They felt that some one of the company must die soon—which one they well knew ; and during the last three or four days of their terrible voyage they were patiently but hungrily waiting for him. I wonder if the subject of these anticipa- tions knew what they were thinking of 1 He must have known it—he must have felt it. They had even calculated how long he would last. They said to themselves, but not to each other—I think they said, M He will die Saturday— and then ! There was one exception to the spirit of delicacy I have 116 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. mentioned—a Frenchman—who kept an eye of strong personal interest upon the sinking man, and noted his fading strength with untiring care and some degree of cheerfulness. He frequently said to Thomas, I think he will go off pretty soon now, sir; and then we'll eat him ! This is very sad. Thomas, and also several of the men, state that the sick Portyghee, during the five days that they were entirely out of provisions, actually ate two silk handkerchiefs and a couple of cotton shirts, besides his share of the boots, and bones, and lumber. Captain Mitchell was fifty-six years old on the twelfth of June—the fortieth day after the burning of the ship, and the third day before the boat's crew reached land. He said it looked somewhat as if it might be the last one he was going to enjoy. He had no birthday feast except some bits of ham-canvas—no luxury but this, and no substantial save the leather and oaken bucket-staves. Speaking of the latter diet, one of the men told me he was obliged to eat a pair of boots, which were so old and rotten that they were full of holes; and then he smiled gently, and said he didn't know, though, but what the holes tasted about as good as the balance of the boct. This man was very feeble, and after saying that he went to bed- HONOURED AS A CURIOSITY IN HONOLULU, IF you get into conversation with a stranger in Honolulu, and experience that natural desire to know what sort of ground you are treading on by finding out what manner of man your stranger is, strike out boldly and address him as Captain. Watch him narrowly, and if you see by his countenance that you are on the wrong track, ask him where he preaches. It is a safe bet that he is either a mis- sionary or captain of a whaler. I became personally ac- quainted with seventy-two captains and ninety-six mis- sionaries. The captains and ministers form one-half of the population; the third fourth is composed of common Ka- nakas and mercantile foreigners and their families ; and the final fourth is made up of high officers of the Hawaiian go- vernment. And there are just about cats enough for three apiece all around. A solemn stranger met me in the suburbs one day, and said: "Good morning, your reverence. Preach in the stone church yonder, no doubt V' "No, I don't. I'm not a preacher. Really, I beg your pardon, captain. I trust you had a good season. How much oil— Oil! Why what do you take me for? I'm not a whaler. Oh ! I beg ft thousand pardons, your Excellency. Major- General in the household troops, no doubt ? Minister of the us MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. Interior, likely] Secretary of War] First Gentleman of the Bedchamber ] Commissioner of the Royal— Stuff! man. I'm no official. I'm not connected in any way with the Government. Bless my life ! Then who the mischief are you ] what the mischief are you] and how the mischief did you get here ] and where in thunder did you come from ]'' I'm only a private personage—an unassuming stranger —lately arrived from America. No ! Not a missionary ! not a whaler ! not a member of his Majesty's Government! not even Secretary of the Navy ! Ah ! heaven! it is too blissful to be true; alas! I do but dream. And yet that noble, honest countenance—those oblique, ingenuous eyes—that massive head, incapable of— of—anything ; your hand; give me your hand, bright waif Excuse these tears. For sixteen weary years I have yearned for a moment like this, and Here his feelings were too much for him, and he swooned away. I pitied this poor creature from the bottom of my heart. I was deeply moved. I shed a few tears on him, and kissed him for his mother. I then took what small change he had, and shoved. REMARKABLE INSTANCES OF PRESENCE OF MIND. 'T'HE steamer Ajax encountered a terrible storm on her down trip from San Francisco to the Sandwich Islands. It tore her light spars and rigging all to shreds and splinters, upset all furniture that could be upset, and spilled passengers around and knocked them hither and thither with a perfect looseness. For forty-eight hours no table could be set, and everybody had to eat as best they might under the circumstances. Most of the party went hungry, though, and attended to their praying. But there was one set of seven-up players who nailed a card-table to the floor and stuck to their game through thick and thin. Captain F , of a great bank- ing-house in San Francisco, a man of great coolness and presence of mind, was of this party. One night the storm suddenly culminated in a climax of unparalleled fury ; the vessel went down on her beam ends, and everything let go with a crash—passengers, tables, cards, bottles—every thing came clattering to the floor in a chaos of disorder and confusion. In a moment fifty sore distressed and pleading voices ejaculated, O Heaven ! help us in our extremity! and one voice rang out clear and sharp above the plaintive chorus and said, Remember, boys, I played the tray for low I It was one of the gentlemen I have mentioned who spoke. And the remark showed good presence of mind and an eye to business. 120 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. Lewis L , of a great hotel in San Francisco, was a passenger. There were some savage grizzly bears chained in cages on deck. One night in the midst of a hurricane, which was accompanied by rain and thunder and lightning, Mr. L. came up, on his way to bed. Just as he stepped into the pitchy darkness of the deck and reeled to the still more pitchy motion of the vessel (bad), the captain sang ont hoarsely through his speaking trumpet, Bear a hand aft, there ! The words were sadly marred and jumbled by the roaring wind. Mr. L thought the captain said, The bears are after you there ! and he let go all holts and went down into his boots. He murmured, I knew how it was going to be—I just knew it from the start—I said along that those bears would get loose some time ; and now I'll be the first man that they'll snatch. Captain ! captain !—can't hear me—storm roars so ! O God ! what a fate ! I have avoided wild beasts all my life, and now to be eaten by a grizzly bear in the middle of the ocean, a thousand miles from land ! Captain ! O captain !— bless my soul, there's one of them—I've got to cut and run ! And he did cut and run, and smashed through the door of the first state-room he came to. A gentle- man and his wife were in it. The gentleman exclaimed, Who's that 1 The refugee gasped out, 0 great Scotland ! those bears are loose, and just raising merry hell all over the ship 1 and then sunk down exhausted. The gentleman sprang out of bed and locked the door, and prepared for a siege. After a while, no assault being made, a reconnoissance was made from the window, and a vivid flash of lightning revealed a clear deck. Mr. L then made a dart for his own state-room, gained it, locked himself in, and felt that his body's salvation was accomplished, and by little less than a miracle. The next day the subject of this memoir- though still INSTANCES OF PRESENCE OF MINE. very feeble and nervous, had the hardihood to make a joke upon his adventure. He said that whfen he found himself in so tight a pla.ce fas Jhe thought) he didn't bear it with much fortitude, and when he found himself safe at last in his state-room, he regarded it as the bearest escape he had ever had in his life. He then went to bed and did not get up again for nine days. This unquestionably bad joke cast a gloom over the whole ship's company, and no effort was sufficient do restore* their1 wonted cheerfulness until the vessel reached her port, and other scenes erased it from their memories. THE STEED "OAHU. HE landlord of the American hotel at Honolulu said till party had been gone nearly an hour, but that he could gi™ me my choice of several horses that could easily overtake them. I said, Never mind—I preferred a safe horse to aj fast one—I would like to have an excessively gentle horse- a horse with no spirit whatever—a lame one, if he had suck a thing. Inside of five minutes I was mounted, and perfectly satisfied with my outfit. I had no time to label him, This is a horse, and so if the public took him for a sheep I can not help it. I was satisfied, and that was the main thing. 1' could see that he had as many fine points as any man's horse, and I just hung my hat on one of them, behind the saddle, and swabbed the perspiration from my face and started. I named him after this island, Oahu, (pronounced O-waw- hoo.) The first gate he came to he started in ; I had neither whip nor spur, and so I simply argued the case with him. He firmly resisted argument, but ultimately yielded "to insult and abuse. He backed out of that gate and steered for another one on the other side of the street. I triumphed by my former process, Within the next six hundred yards he crossed the street fourteen times, and attempted thirteen gates, and in the mean time the tropical sun was beating down and threatening to cave the top of my head in, and I was literally dripping with perspiration and profanity. (I am only human, and I was sorely aggravated; I shall behave THE STEED OAHU. 123 better next time.) lie quit the gate business after that, and went along peaceably enough, but absorbed in meditation. I noticed this latter circumstance, and it soon began to fill me with the gravest apprehension. 1 said to myself, This malig- nant brute is planning some new outrage—some fresh de- vilry or other ; no horse ever thought over a subject so pro- foundly as this one is doing just for nothing. The more this thing preyed upon my mind the more uneasy I became, until at last the suspense became unbearable, and I dismounted to see if there was anything wild in his eye ; for I had heard that the eye of this noblest of our domestic animals is very expressive. I cannot describe what a load of anxiety was lifted from my mind when I found that he was only asleep. I woke him up and started him into a faster walk, and then the inborn villany of his nature came out again. He tried to climb over a stone wall five or six feet high. I saw that I must apply force to this horse, and that I might as well begin first as last. I plucked a stout switch from a tamarind tree, and the moment he saw it he gave in. He broke into a convulsive sort of a canter, which had three short steps in it and one long one, and reminded me alternately of the clattering shake of the great earthquake and the sweeping plunging of the Ajax in a storm. A STRANGE DREAM. Breamed at the Volcano House, Crater of Kileanaf Sand• wich Islands, April 1, 1866. ALL day long I have sat apart and pondered over tha mysterious occurrences of last night. . . There is no link lacking in the chain of incidents—my memory pre- sents each in its proper order with perfect distinctness, but still— However, never mind these reflections—I will drop them and proceed to make a simple statement of the facts. Towards eleven o'clock, it was suggested that the charac- ter of the night was peculiarly suited to viewing the mightiest active volcano on the earth's surface in its most impressive sublimity. There was no light of moon or star in the inky • heavens to mar the effect of the crater's gorgeous pyrotech- nics. In due time I stood, with my companion, on the wall of the vast cauldron which the natives, ages ago, named Hale man mau—the abyss wherein they were wont to throw the remains of the chiefs, to the end that vulgar feet might never tread above them. We stood there, at dead of night, a mile above the level of the sea, and looked down a thousand feet upon a boiling, surging, roaring ocean of fire !— shaded our eyes from the blinding glare, and gazed far away over the crimson waves with a vague notion that a supernatural fleet, manned by demons and freighted with the damned, might A S7RAE&E DREAM. presently sail up out of the remote distance ; started when tremendous thunder-bursts shook the earth, and followed with fascinated eyes the grand jets of molten lava that sprang high up toward the zenith and exploded in a world of fiery spray that lit up the sombre heavens with an infernal splendour. What is your little bonfire of Vesuvius to this V' My ejaculation roused my companion from his reverie, and we fell into a conversation appropriate to the occasion and the surroundings. We came at last to speak of the ancient custom of casting the bodies of dead chieftains into this fearful cauldron ; and my comrade, who js of the blood royal, mentioned that the founder of his race, old King Kamehameha the First—that invincible old pagan Alexander —had found other sepulture than the burning depths of the Hale mau mau. I grew interested at once ; I knew that the mystery of what became of the corpse of the warrior king had never been fathomed ; I was aware that there was a legend connected with this matter ; and I felt as if there could be no more fitting time to listen to it than the present. The descendant of the Kamehamehas said :— The dead king was brought in royal state down the long winding road that descends from the rim of the crater to the scorched and chasm-riven plain that lies between the IIale mau man and those beetling walls yonder in the distance. "The guards were set and the troops of mourners began the weird wail for the departed. In the middle of the night came a sound of innumerable voices in the air, and the rush of invisible wings ; the funeral torches wavered, burned blue and went out. The mourners and watchers fell to the ground paralyzed by fright, and many minutes elapsed before any one dared to move or speak; for they believed that the phantom messengers of the dread Goddess of Fire had been in their midst. When at last a torch was lighted, the bier was vacant—the dead monarch had been spirited away ! 126 MARK- TWAIN'S J UMPING FROG. Consternation seized upon all, and they fled out of the crater. When day dawned, the multitude returned and began the search for the corpse. But not a footprint, not a sign was ever found. Day after day the search was continued, and every cave in the great walls, and every chasm in the plain, for miles around, was examined, but all to no purpose ; and from that day to this the resting-place of the lion king's bones is an unsolved mystery. But years afterward, when the grim prophetess Wiahowakawak lay on her deathbed, the goddess Pele appeared to her in a vision, and told her that eventually the secret would be revealed, and in a re- markable manner, but not until the great Kauhuhu, the Shark god, should desert the sacred cavern AuaPuhi, in the Island of Molokai, and the waters of the sea should no more visit it, and its floors should become dry. Ever since that time the simple, confiding natives have watched for the sign. And now, after many and many a summer has coine and gone, and they who were in the flower of youth then have waxed old and died, the day is at hand ! The great Shark god has deserted the Aua Puhi : a month ago, for the first time within records of the ancient legends, the waters of the sea ceased to flow into the cavern, and its stony pave- ment is become dry ! As you may easily believe, the news of this event spread like wildfire through the islands, and now the natives are looking every hour for the miracle which is to unveil the mystery and reveal the secret grave of the dead hero. After I had gone to bed I got to thinking of the volcanic magnificence we had witnessed, and could not go to sleep. I hunted up a book, and concluded to pass the time in read- ing. The first chapter I came upon related several instances of remarkable revelations, made to men through the agency of dreams—of roads and houses, trees, fences, and all manner of landmarks, shown in visions and recognised afterwards in A STRANGE DREAM. 127 waking hours, and which served to point the way to some dark mystery or other. At length I fell asleep, and dreamed that I was abroad in the great plain that skirts the Hale maw maw. I stood in a sort of twilight which softened the outlines of surrounding objects, but still left them tolerably distinct, A gaunt, muffled figure stepped out from the shadow of a rude column of lava, and moved away with a slow and measured step beckoning me to follow. I did so. 1 marched down, down, down hundreds of feet, upon a narrow trail which wound its tortuous course through piles and pyramids of seamed and blackened lava, and under overhanging masses of sulphur formed by the artist hand of nature into an infinitude of fanciful shapes. The thought crossed my mind that possibly my phantom guide might lead me down among the bowels of the crater, and then disappear and leave me to grope my way through its mazes, and work out my deliverence as best I might; and so, with an eye to such a contingency, I picked up a stone and blazed my course by breaking off a pro- jecting corner, occasionally, from lava walls and festoons of sulphur. Finally we turned into a cleft in the crater's side, and pursued our way through its intricate windings for many a fathom down toward the home of the subterranean fires our course lighted all the while by a ruddy glow which filtered up through innumerable cracks and crevices, and which afforded me occasional glimpses of the flood of molten fire boiling and hissing in the profound depths beneath us The heat was intense, and the sulphurous atmosphere suffo- eating ; but I toiled on in the footsteps of my stately guide, and uttered no complaint. At last we came to a sort of rugged chamber whose sombre and blistered walls spake with mute eloquence of some fiery tempest that had spent, its fury here in a bygone age. The spectre pointed to a great boulder at the farther extremity—stood and pointed silent and motionless, for a few fleeting moments, and then disap- 128 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. peared ! !! The grave of the last Kamehameha! The words swept mournfully by, from an unknown source, and died away in the distant corridors of my prison-house, and I was alone in the bowels of the earth, in the home of desolation, in the presence of death ! My first frightened impulse was to fly, but a stronger impulse arrested me and impelled me to approach the massive boulder the spectre had pointed at. With heri- taring step I went forward and stood beside it—nothing there. I grew bolder, and walked around and about it, peering shrewdly into the shadowy half light that sur- rounded it—still nothing. I paused to consider what to do next. While I stood irresolute, I chanced to brush the pondrous stone with my elbow, and lo ! it vibrated to my touch ! I would as soon have thought of starting a kiln of bricks with my feeble hand. My curiosity was excited. I bore against the boulder, and it still yielded ; I gave a sudden push with my whole strength, and it toppled from its foundation with a crash that sent the echoes thundering down the avenues and passages of the dismal cavern ! And there, in a shallow excavation over which it had rested, lay the crumbling skeleton of King Kamehameha the Great, thus sepulchred in long years by supernatural hands ! The bones could be none other ; for with them lay the rare and priceless crown of pulamcdama coral, sacred to royalty, and tabu to all else beside. A hollow human groan issued out of the— I woke up. How glad I was to know it was all a dream ! This comes of listening to the legend of the noble lord— of reading of those lying dream revelations —of allowing myself to be carried away by the wild beauty of old Kileana at midnight—of gorging too much pork and beans for supper ! And so I turned over and fell asleep again. And dreamed the same dream precisely as before ; followed the phantom—"blazed my course—arrived at the grim A STRANGE DREAM. 129 chamber—heard the sad spirit voice—overturned the massy stone—beheld the regal crown and decaying bones of the great king! I woke up, and reflected long upon the curious and singularly vivid dream, and finally muttered to myself, This—this is becoming serious! I fell asleep again, and again I dreamed the same dream, without a single variation ! I slept no more, but tossed restlessly in bed, and longed for daylight. And when it came I wandered forth, and descended to the wide plain in the crater. I said to myself, I am not superstitious • but if there is anything in that dying woman's prophecy, I am the instrument appointed to uncurtain this ancient mys- tery. As I walked along, I even half expected to see my solemn guide step out from some nook in the lofty wall, and beckon me to come on. At last, when I reached the place where I had first seen him in my dream, I recognised every surrounding object, and there, winding down among the blocks and fragments of lava, saw the very trail I had traversed in my vision ! I resolved to traverse it again, come what might. I wondered if, in my unreal journey, I had blazed my way, so that it would stand the test of stern reality , and thus wondering, a chill went to my heart when I came to the first stony projection I had broken off in my dream, and saw the fresh new fracture, and the dis- membered fragment lying on the ground ! My curiosity rose up and banished all fear, and I hurried along as fast as the rugged road would allow me. I looked for my other blazes, and found them; found the cleft in the wall; recognised all its turnings ; walked in the light that ascended from the glowing furnaces visible far below ; sweated in the close, hot atmosphere, and breathed the sulphurous smoke—and at last I stood hundreds of feet beneath the peaks of Kileana in the ruined chamber, and in the presence of the mysterious boulder ! This is no dream, I said; this is a revelation from 130 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. the realm of the supernatural; and it becomes not me to longer reason, conjecture, suspect, but blindly to obey the impulse given me by the unseen power that guides me. I moved with a slow and reverend step towards the stone, and bore against it. It yielded perceptibly to the pressure. I brought my full weight and strength to bear, and surged against it. It yielded again ; but I was so enfeebled by my toilsome journey that I could not overthrow it. I rested a little, and then raised an edge of the boulder by a strong, steady push, and placed a small stone under it to keep it from sinking back to its place. I rested again, and then repeated the process. Before long, I had added a third prop, and had got the edge of the boulder considerably elevated. The labour and the close atmosphere together were so exhausting, however, that I was obliged to lie down then, and recuperate my strength by a longer season of rest. And so, hour after hour I laboured, growing more and more weary, but still upheld by a fascination which I felt was infused into me by the invisible powers whose will I was working. At last I concentrated my strength into a final effort, and the stone rolled from its position. I can never forget the overpowering sense of awe that sank down like a great darkness upon my spirit at that moment. After a solemn pause to prepare myself, with bowed form and uncovered head, I slowly turned my gaze till it rested upon the spot where the great stone had lain. There wasn't any bones there ! I just said to myself, Well if this an't the blastedest, infernalest swindle that ever I've come across yet, I wish I may never !'' And then I scratched out of there, and marched up here to the Yolcano House, and got out my old raw-boned fool of a horse, "Oahu, and "lammed him till he couldn't stand up without leaning against something. You cannot bet anything on dreams. ADVICE FOR GOOD LITTLE GIRLS. OOD little girls ought not to make mouths at their teachers for every trifling offence. This kind of re- taliation should only be resorted to under peculiarly ag- gravated circumstances. If you have nothing but a rag doll stuffed with saw-dust, while one of your more fortunate little playmates has a costly china one, you should treat her with a show of kindness nevertheless. And you ought not to attempt to make a forcible swap with her unless your conscience would justify you in it, and you know you are able to do it. You ought never to take your little brother's chawing- gum away from him by main force : it is better to rope bim in with the promise of the first two dollars and a half you find floating down the river on a grindstone. In the artless simplicity natural to his time of life, he will regard it as a perfectly fair transaction. In all ages of the world lliis eminently plausible fiction has lured the obtuse infant to financial ruin and disaster. If at any time you find it necessary to correct your brother, do not correct him with mud—never on any account throw mud at him, because it will soil his clothes. It is better to scald him a little ; for then you attain two desirable results —you secure his immediate attention to the lesson you are inculcating, and at the same time, your hot water will have 132 ADVICE FOR GOOD LITTLE GRTLS. a tendency to remove impurities from his person—and possibly the skin also, in spots. If your mother tells you to do a thing, it is wrong to reply that you won't. It is better and more becoming to intimate that you will do as she bids you, and then afterwards act quietly in the matter according to the dictates of your better judgment. You should ever bear in mind that it is to your kind parents that you are indebted for your food and your nice bed and your beautiful clothes, and for the privilege of staying home from school when you let on that you are sick. Therefore you ought to respect their little prejudices and humour their little whims, and put up with their little foibles, until they get to crowding you too much. Good little girls should always show marked deference for the aged. You ought never to sass old people—unless they sass you first. CONCERNING CHAMBERMAIDS. A GAINST all chambermaids, of whatsoever age 01 nationality, I launch the curse of bachelordom ! Because ; They always put the pillows at the opposite end of the bed from the gas-burner, so that while you read and smoke before sleeping (as is the ancient and honoured custom of bachelors), you have to hold your book aloft, in an uncomfortable position, to keep the light from dazzling your eyes. When they find the pillows removed to the other end of the bed in the morning, they receive not the suggestion in a friendly spirit; but glorying in their absolute sovereignty, and unpitying your helplessness, they make the bed just as it was originally, and gloat in secret over the pang their tyranny will cause you. Always after that, when they find you have transposed the pillows, they undo your work, and thus defy and seek to embitter the life that God has given you. If they cannot get the light in an inconvenient position any other way, they move the bed. If you pull your trunk out six inches from the wall, so that the lid will stay up when you open it, they always shove that trunk back again. They do it on purpose. If you want the spittoon in a certain spot, where it will be handy, they don't, and so they move it. 134 MARK TWAIN'S JUMPING FROG. They always put your other boots into inaccessible places. They chiefly enjoy depositing them as far under the bed as the wall will permit. It is because this compels you to get down in an undignified attitude and make wild sweeps for them in the dark with the boot-jack, and swear. They always put the match-box in some other jpface. They hunt up a new place for it every day, and put up a bottle, or other perishable glass thing, where the^box stood before. This is to cause you to break that glass thing, groping in the dark, and get yourself into trouble. They are for ever and ever moving the furniture. When you come in, in the night, you can calculate on finding the bureau where the wardrobe was in the morning. And when you go out in the morning, if you leave the slop- bucket by the door and rocking-chair by the window, when you come in at midnight, or thereabouts, you will fall over that rocking-chair, and you will proceed toward the window and sit down in that slop-tub. This will disgust you. They like that. No matter where you put anything, they are not going to let it stay there. They will take it and move it the first chance they get. It is their nature. And, besides, it gives them pleasure to be mean and contrary this way. They would die if they couldn't be villains. They always save up all the old scraps of printed rubbish you throw on the floor, and stack them up carefully on the table, and start the fire with your valuable manuscripts. If there is any one particular old scrap that you are more down on than any other, and which you are gradually wearing your life out trying to get rid of, you may take all the pains you possibly can in that direction, but it won't be of any "use, because they will always fetch that old scrap back and put it in the same old place again every time. It 4ies them good. And they use up more hair-oil than any six men. If CONCERNING CHA MBERMA IDS. 155 charge*} with purloining the same, they lie about it. What do they care about a hereafter ? Absolutely nothing. If you leave the key in the door for convenience sake, they will carry it down to the office and give it to the clerk. They do this under the vile pretence of trying to protect your property from thieves ; but actually they do it because they wjpit to make you tramp back downstairs after it when you coffie home tired, or put you to the trouble of sending a waiter for it, which waiter will expect you to pay him some- thing. In which case I suppose the degraded creatures divide. They keep always trying to make your bed before you get up, thus destroying your rest and inflicting agony upon you ; but after you get up, they don't come any more till next day. They do all the mean things they can think of, and they do them out of pure cussedness, and nothing else. Chambermaids are dead to every human instinct. I hive cursed them in behalf of outraged lachelordom They deserve if. If 1 can get a bill through the Legislature abolishing chambermaids, I mean to do it. SCREAMERS. SCREAMERS. « I. HOLIDAY LITERATURE. POEMS RY MOTHER GOOSE, AND CRITICISM. [The following criticism of Mother Goose, by Carl fiyn g—which is another name for Mark Twain, we imagine—will repay perusal.] ' I ^ H E poems of this gifted authoress, whose nom de plume hangs high in the "esteem of lovers of early English literature, l;ave perhaps done more to soothe the sorrows of children, to alleviate the irritation of parents, and to preserve domestic tranquillity than any other effusions except the bottled ones of Mrs. Winslow. They are so thoroughly adapted to the average comprehension, and appeal so di- rectly to the universal heart, that they enlist the sympathies and intense interest of millions B 10 MARK TWAIN. whose sensibilities Shakespeare, Milton, or Walt Whitman can't begin to touch. Owing to lack of space, we are compelled to limit our extracts to the first poem, which we quote in lull, with a few commentaries sug gested by its most effective passages. It is condensed epic, much shorter but a good deal stronger than the Illiad. In a few masterly touches it presents a graphic picture of some phenomena that never could have been evolved from the imagination of the writer, save under the stimulus of a high-pressure and delirious inspiration. There is no tiresome prelude nor preliminary scoring about it. On the contrary, it strikes its gait Avith the promptitude and vivacity oi a hand organ. Hey diddle diddle ! The cat's in the fiddle ; The cow jumped over the moon ! The little dog laughed to see the sport— The dish ran away with the spoon ! If genius is, as the modern school of poets seems to regard it, simply the power of felici- tous ambiguity of expression, our authoress may safely rest her claims to its possession upon the invocation, "Hey diddle diddle! Those words express in a weird and mystic HOLIDAY LITERATURE. 11 way several of those unintelligible aspirations and internal yearnings over which many modern poets have spent a lifetime of vague and ineffective drivel. The reader will not fail to note the subtle art which brings out and intensifies the writer's repetition of the word diddle "—a word as stirring as a ride over a corduroy road. It is by little refinements like this that she betrays the poetic faculty (shamelessly) whenever she has a chance. Of course, the statement that a the cat's in, the fiddle cannot be accepted literally. It is still a vexed question with the critics whether the authoress (excuse me—the gifted authoress) intended this line for a sly satire upon the violin, or for a euphemistic allusion to the material of which its strings are com- posed. Anyhow, it is a tip-top poetical conceit. We venture to say that nothing in the whole range of literature displays any approach to the audacity of imagination involved in the assertion that "the cow jumped over the moon To imagine this unwieldy tributary of th® cheese factory successfully achieving the extraordinary feat of jumping over the moon, argues a superhuman fertility and reck- lessness of jnyention wh^h pales even Mr 12 HARK TWAIN. Weed's autobiography. What would be the sensations of the man in the moon called up in the quiet moonlight by the bellowings of this strange visitant? Would fear or wrath predominate? Would he blow out his light and crawl under the bed; or, indignant at careless neighbours, would he apply to some lunatic justice of the peace to have the unruly estray seized and sold for trespass ? These are some of the conundrums with which that single line has vexed the learned commenta- tors. They serve to illustrate the delicious uncertainty into which ambitious poets are fond of plunging their mystified readers. The remark that the little dog laughed to see the sport, shows the tendency of genius to use the veriest trifles; while the graceful transition from the soaring fancy of the pre- vious line to the unsparing simplicity of this affords a pleasant relief to the overtasked mind of the reader. The conclusion of this poem has excited some acrimonious discussion among the critics. Some, whose opinions are generally entitled to deference, insist that the allegation the dish ran away with the spoon was intended as a covert fling at General Butler. Others, quite as plausible, regard it as an allegory E0L1DA Y LIT SIR A TURE. 13 illustrative of the tendency of family crockery to mysterious and untimely disappearance. Our own experience would sustain the latter construction. While one of the German no- bility, in the disguise of a servant girl, was doing our housework, our dishes disappeared one after another, until we were reduced to a single piece of crockery. The female Bis- marck, who gave us a lock of her hair ingeniously entwined in our victuals, solemnly denied any complicity in the matter. In lofty and vociferous German she protested that she weis nicht where the dishes went, and, moreover, that she was too much interested in German unity to vex her Bologna-sausage brain about the unity of our crockery. Subsequent investigation proved that those dishes, unable to harmonise with the ardent- tempered Dutch girl, had deliberately walked out behind the barn and smashed themselves against the underpinning; and their buried fragments lay bleaching on the hill of their sacrifice, mute witnesses of the incompatibility of hired help and crockery. But if you want any holiday poetry Mother Goose can give you as good as there is in the house. u MARK TWAIN II BAKER'S CAT. [The following is a Californian story.] HENEVER Dick Baker, of Deadhorse Gulch, was out of luck, and a little down-hearted, he would fall to mourning over the loss of a wonderful cat he used to own (for where women and children are not, men of kindly impulse take up with pets, for they must "love something). And he always spoke of the strange sagacity of that cat with the air of a man who believed in his secret heart that there was something human about it— maybe even supernatural. I heard him talking about this animal once. He said, Gentlemen, I used to have a cat here, by the name of Tom Quartz, which you'd a took an interest in, I reckon—most anybody would. I had him here eight years, and he was the remarkablest cat I ever see. He was a large grey one of the Tom specie, and he had more hard natural sense than any man in his camp, and a power of dignity; he BAKER'S CAT. 15 wouldn't let the Gov'nor of California be fa- miliar with him. He never ketched a rat in his life—'peared to be above it. He never cared for nothing but mining. He knowed more about mining, that cat did, than any man I ever see. You couldn't tell him nothing about placer digging, and, as for pocket mining, why, he was just born for it. He would dig out after me and Jim when we went over the hills prospecting, and he would trot along behind us for as much as five miles, if we went so far. And he had the best judgment about mining ground : why, you never see anything like it. When we went to work he'd scatter a glance around, and if he didn't think much of the indications he would give a look as to say, ' Well, I'll have to get you to excuse me;' and, without another word, he'd hyste his nose into the air and shove for home. But if the ground suited him he would lay low and keep dark till the first pan was washed, and then he would sidle up and take a look, and if there was about six or seven grains of gold he was satisfied (he didn't want no better prospect 'n that), and then he would lay down on our coats and snore like a steamboat till we'd struck the pocket, and then get up and superintend. 16 MARK TWAIN. Well, by and by up comes this quartz ex- citement. And everybody was into it; every- body was picking and blasting instead of sho- veiling dirt on the hill side; everybody was putting down a shaft instead of scraping the surface. Nothing would do, Jim, but we must tackle the ledges too, and so we did. We commenced putting down a shaft, and Tom Quartz he began to wonder what in the Dickens it was all about. He hadn't ever seen any mining like that before, and he was all upset, as you may say; he couldn't come to a right understanding of it no way; it was too many for him. He was down on it, too, you bet you; he Avas down on it poAverful; and always appeared to consider it the cussedest foolishness out. But that cat, you know, he Avas always agin neAvfangled arrangements; somehoAV he could never abide 'em. You knoAv how it is Avith old habits. But, by and by, Tom Quartz began to get sort of recon- ciled a little, though he never could altogether understand that eternal sinking of a shaft and never panning out anything. At last he got to coming doAvn in the shaft himself to try to cypher it out. And Avhen he'd got the blues, and feel kind o' scruffy, aggravated, and dis- gusted—knoAving, as he did, that the bills was MAKER'S CAT. 1? running up all the time, and Ave warn't making a cent—he would curl up on a gunny sack in the corner and go to sleep. Well, one day Avhen the shaft Avas doAvn about eight foot the rock got so hard that Ave had to put in a blast —the first blasting Ave'd ever done since Tom Quartz Avas born. And then Ave lit the fuse, and dumb out, and got off about fifty yards, and forgot and left Tom Quartz sound asleep on the gunny sack. In about a minute Ave seen a puff of smoke burst up out of the hole, and then everything let go Avith an aAvful crash, and about four million tons of rocks, and dirt, and smoke, and splinters shot up about a mile and a half into the air; and, by George, right in the midst of it Avas old Tom Quartz going end over end, and a-snorting, and a-sneezing, and a-claAving, and a-reaching for things like all possessed. But it Avarn't no use, you know; it warn't no use. And that Avas the last Ave see of him for about tAvo minutes and a half, and then all of a sudden it begin to rain rocks and rubbage, and directly he come doAvn ker whop about ten foot off from Avhere Ave stood. "Well, I reckon he Avas p'raps the orneriest-looking beast you ever see. One MARK twain. ear Avas sot back on his neck, and his tail was stove up, and his eye-Avinkers Avas singed off, and he Avas all blacked up with poAvder and smoke, and all sloppy Avith mud and slush from one end to the other. Well, sir, it Avarn't no use to try to apologise ; Ave couldn't say a Avord. He took a sort of a disgusted look at hisself, and then he looked at us; and it was just exactly the same as if he had said, e Gents, may be you think it's smart to take advantage of a cat that ain't had no experience in quartz- mining, but I think different!' and then he turned on his heel and marched off home, Avithout ever saying another word. That AA'as jest his style. And may be you won't believe it; but after that you never see a cat so prejudiced against quartz-mining as Avhat he Avas. And by and by, when he did get to going doAvn in the shaft agin, you'd a been astonished at his sagacity. The minute Ave'd touch off a blast and the fuse'd begin to sizzle, he'd give a look as much as to say, 'Well, I'll have to get you to excuse me;' and it Avas surprising the Avay he'd run out of that hole and go for a tree. Sagacity ? It ain't no name for it. 'Twas inspiration ! BAKER'S CAT. iS I said, 'Well, Mr. Baker, this prejudice against quartz-mining was remarkable, con- sidering how he came by it. Couldn't you ever cure him of it?' ' Cure him ? No. When Tom Quartz was sot once he was always sot, and you might a blowed him up as' much as three million times, and you'd never a broke him of his cussed pre- judice agin quartz-mining.' The affection and the pride that lit up Baker's face when he delivered this tribute to the firmness of his humble friend of other days will always be a vivid memory with me. MARK TWAIN. III. THE STORY OF THE GOOD LITTLE BOY WHO DID NOT PROSPER. [The following has been written at the instance ol several literary friends, who thought that, if the history of The Bad Little Boy who Did not Come to Grief (a moral sketch which I published five or six years ago) was worthy of preservation several weeks in print, a fair and unprejudiced companion-piece to it would deserve a similar immortality.] /^NCE there was a good little boy by the name of Jacob Blivens. He always obeyed his parents, no matter how absurd and unreasonable their demands were; and he always learned his book, and never was late at Sabbath School. He would not play hookey, even when his sober judgment told him it was the most profitable thing he could do. None of the other boys could ever make that boy out, he acted so strangely. He wouldn't lie, no matter how convenient it was. He just said it was wrong to lie, and that was sufficient for him. And he was so honest thai STORY OF A GOOD LITTLE BOY. 21 he was simply ridiculous. The curious ways that that Jacob had surpassed everything. He wouldn't play marbles on Sunday, he wouldn't rob birds' nests, he wouldn't give hot pennies to ongan-grinders' monkeys; he didn't seem to take any interest in any kind of rational amusement. So the other boys used to try to reason it out and come to an under- standing of him, but they couldn't arrive at any satisfactory conclusion. As I said before, they could only figure out a sort of vague idea that he was afflicted, and so they took him under their protection, and never allowed any harm to come to him. This good little boy read all the Sunday- school books; they were his greatest delight. This was the whole secret of it. He believed in the good little boys they putin the Sunday- school books; he had every confidence in them. He longed to come across one of them alive, once; but he never did. They all died before his time, maybe. Whenever he read about a particularly good one he turned over quickly to the end to see what became of him, because he wanted to travel thousands of miles and gaze on him; but it wasn't any use; that good little boy always died in the last chapter, and there was a picture of the funeral, with all his 22 MARK TWAIN. relations and the Sunday-school children stand- ing around the grave in pantaloons that were too short, and bonnets that were too large, and everybody crying into handkerchiefs that had as much as a yard and a half of stuff in them. He was always headed off in this way. He never could see one of those good little boys on account of his always dying in the last chapter. Jacob had a noble ambition to be put in a Sunday-school book. He wanted to be put in, with pictures representing him gloriously de- clining to lie to his mother, and her weeping for joy about it; and pictures representing him standing on the doorstep giving a penny to a poor beggar-woman with six children, and telling her to spend it freely, but not to be extravagant, because extravagance is a sin; and pictures of him magnanimously refusing to tell on the bad boy who always lay in wait for him around the corner as he came from school, and welted him over the head with a lath, and then chased him home, saying, Hi! hi! . as he proceeded. That was the ambition of young Jacob Blivens. He wished to be put in a Sunday-school book. It made him feel a little uncomfortable sometimes when lie re- fleeted that the good little boys always died. STORY OF A GOOD LITTLE BOY. 23 He loved to live, you know, and this was the most unpleasant feature akout being a Sunday- school-book boy. He knew it was not healthy to be good. He knew it was more fatal than consumption to be so supernaturally good as the boys in the books were; he knew that none of them had ever been able to stand it long, and it pained him to think that if they put him in a book he wouldn't ever see it, or even if they did get the book out before he died it wouldn't be popular without any pic- ture of his funeral in the back part of it. It couldn't be much of a Sunday-school book that couldn't tell about the advice he gave to the oommunity when he was dying. So at last, of course, he had to make up his mind to do the best he could under the circumstances—to live right, and hang on as long as he could, and have his dying speech all ready when his time came. But somehow nothing ever went right with this good little boy; nothing ever turned out with him the way it turned out with the good little boys in the books. They always had a good time, and the bad boys had the broken legs; but in his case there was a screAV loose somewhere, and it all happened just the other way. When he found Jim ]3hdv§ stealing MARK TWAIN. apples, and went under the tree to read to him about the bad little boy who fell out of a neighbour's apple-tree and broke his arm, Jim fell out of the tree too, but he fell on him, and broke his arm, and Jim wasn't hurt at all. Jacob couldn't understand that. There wasn't anything in the books like it. And once, when some bad boys pushed a blind man over in the mud, and Jacob ran to help him up and receive his blessing, the blind man did not give him any blessing at all, but whacked him over the head with his stick and said he would like to catch him shoving him again, and then pretending to help him up. This was not in accordance with any of the books. Jacob looked them all over to see. One thing that Jacob wanted to do was to find a lame dog that hadn't any place to stay, and was hungry and persecuted, and bring him home and pet him and have that dog's im- perishable gratitude. And at last he found one and was happy ; and he brought him home and fed him, but when he was going to pet him the dog flew at him and tore all the clothes off him except those that were in front, and made a spectacle of him that was astonishing. He examined authorities, but he could not understand the matter. It was of the same STORY OF A GOOD LITTLE BOY. 25 breed of dogs that was in the books, but it acted very differently. Whatever this boy did he got into trouble. The very things the boys in the books got rewarded for turned out to be about the most unprofitable things he could invest in. Once when he was on his way to Sunday school he saw some bad boys starting off plea- suring in a sail-boat. He was filled with con- sternation, because he knew from his reading that boys who went sailing on Sunday invari- ably got drowned. So he ran out on a raft to warn them, but a log turned with him and slid him into the river. A man got him out pretty soon, and the doctor pumped the water out of him, and gave him a fresh start with his bel- lows, but he caught cold and lay sick a-bed nine weeks. But the most unaccountable thing about it was that the bad boys in the boat had a good time all day, and then reached home alive and well in the most surprising manner. Jacob Blivens said there was nothing like these things in the books. He was perfectly dumb- founded. When he got well he was a little discouraged, but he resolved to keep on trying anyhow. He knew that so far his experiences wouldn't do to go in a book, but he hadn't yet reached c 26 MARK TWAIN. the allotted term of life for good little boys, and he hoped to be able to make a record yet if he could hold on till his time was fully up. If everything else failed he had his dying speech to fall back on. He examined his authorities, and found that it was now time for him to go to sea as a cabin- boy. He called on a ship captain and made his application, and when the captain asked for his recommendations he proudly drew out a tract and pointed to the words, To Jacob Blivens, from his affectionate teacher. But the captain was a coarse vulgar man, ^and he said, Oh, that be blowed! that wasn't any proof that he knew how to wash dishes or handle a slush-bucket, and he guessed he didn't want him. This was altogether the most extraordinary thing that ever happened to Jacob in all his life. A compliment from a teacher, on a tract, had never failed to move the tenderest emotions of ship captains, and open the way to all offices of honour and profit in their gift—it never had in any book that ever he had read. He could hardly believe his senses. This boy always had a hard time of it. No- thing ever came out according to the authori- ties with him. At last, one day, when he was STORY OF A GOOD LITTLE BOY. 27 around hunting up bad little boys to admonish, he found a lot of them in the old iron foundry fixing up a little joke on fourteen or fifteen dogs, which they had tied together in long procession and were going to ornament with empty nitro-glycerine cans made fast to their tails. Jacob's heart was touched. He sat down on one of those cans (for he never minded grease when duty was before him), and he took hold of the foremost dog by the collar, and turned his reproving eye upon wicked Tom Jones. But just at that moment Alderman McWelter, full of wrath, stepped in. All the bad boys ran away, but Jacob Blivens rose in conscious innocence and began one of those stately little Sunday-School-book speeches which always commence with Oh, sir! in dead opposition to the fact that no boy, good or bad, ever starts a remark with Oh, sir ! But the alderman never waited to hear the rest. He took Jacob Blivens by the ear and turned him around, and hit him a whack in the rear with the flat of his hand; and in an instant that good little boy shot out through the roof and soared away towards the sun, with the fragments of those fifteen dogs stringing: after him like the tail of a kite. And O D there wasn't a sign of that alderman or tnat 28 MARK TWAIN. old iron foundry left on the face of the earth ; and, as for young Jacob Blivens, he never got a chance to make his last dying speech after all his trouble fixing it up, unless he made it to the birds; because, although the bulk of him came down all right in a tree-top in an adjoin- ing county, the rest of him was apportioned around among four townships, and so they had to hold five inquests on him to find out whether he was dead or not, and how it occurred. You never saw a boy scattered so. Thus perished the good little boy who did the best he could, but didn't come out accord- ing to the books. Every boy who ever did as he did prospered except him. His case is truly remarkable. It will probably never be accounted for STORY OF THE BAD LITTLE BOY. 29 IV. STORY OF THE BAD LITTLE BOY. /"VNCE there was a bad little boy whose name was Jim—though, if you will notice, you will find that bad little boys are nearly always called James in your Sunday School books. It was very strange, but still it was true that this one was called Jim. He didn't have any sick mother either—a sick mother who was pious and had the con- sumption, and would be glad to lie down in the grave and be at rest but for the strong love she bore her boy, and the anxiety she felt that the world would be harsh and cold towards him when she was gone. Most bad boys in the Sunday books are named James, and have sick mothers, who teach them to say, "Now, I lay me down, etc., and sing them to sieep with sweet plaintive voices, and tnen kiss them good-night, and kneel down by the bedside and weep. But it was different with this fel- low. He was named Jim, and there wasn't anything the matter with his mother—no con- 30 MARK TWAIN. sumption, nor anything of that kind. She was rather stout than otherwise, and she was not pious; moreover, she was not anxious on Jim's account. She said if he were to break his neck it wouldn't be much. loss. She always spanked Jim to sleep, and she never kissed him good-night; on the contrary, she boxed his ears when she was ready to leave him. Once this little bad boy stole the key of the pantry, and slipped in there and helped himself to some jam, and filled up the vessel with tar, so that his mother would never know the dif- ference; but all at once a terrible feeling didn't come over him, and something didn't seem to whisper to him Is it right to disobey my mother ? Isn't it sinful to do this ? Where do bad little boys go who gobble up their good kind mother's jam ? and then he didn't kneel down all alone and promise never to be wicked any more, and rise up with a light happy heart, and go and tell his mother all about it, and beg her forgiveness, and be blessed by her with tears of pride and thankfulness in her eyes. No ; that is the way with all other bad boys in the books ; but it happened otherwise with this J im, strangely enough. He ate that jam, and said it was bully, in his sinful vulgar way; and he put in the tar, and said that was bully STORY OF THE BAD LITTLE BOY. 31 also, and laughed, and observed (i that the old woman would get up and snort when she found it out; and when she did find it out he denied knowing anything about it, and she whipped him severely, and he did the crying himself. Everything about this boy was cu- rios—everything turned out differently with him from the way it does to the bad Jameses in the books. Once he climbed up in Farmer Acorn's apple- tree to steal apples, and the limb didn't break, and he didn't fall and break his arm, and get torn by the farmer's great dog, and then lan- guish on a sick bed for weeks, and repent and become good. Oh! no; he stole as many apples as he wanted, and came down all right; and he was all ready for the dog too, and knocked him endways with a rock when he came to tear him. It was very strange—■ nothing like it ever happened in those mild little books with marbled backs, and with pic- tures in them of men with swallow-tailed coats and bell-crowned hats, and pantaloons that are short in the legs, and women with the waists of their dresses under their arms and no hoops on. Nothing like it in any of the Sunday School books. Once he stole the teacher's penknife, and, 32 MARK TWAIN. when he was afraid it would be found out and he would get whipped, he slipped it into George Wilson's cap—poor Widow Wilson's son, the moral boy, the good little boy of the village, who always obeyed his mother, and never told an untruth, and was fond of his lessons and infatuated with Sunday school. And when the knife dropped from the cap, and poor George hung his head and blushed, as if in conscious guilt, and the grieved teacher charged the theft upon him, and was just in the very act of bringing the switch down upon his trembling shoulders, a white-haired improbable justice of the peace did not suddenly appear in their midst and strike an attitude and say, Spare this noble boy—there stands the cowering cul- prit! I was passing the school-door at recess, and, unseen myself, I saw the theft com- mitted! And then Jim didn't get whaled, and the venerable justice didn't read the tear- ful school a homily, and take George by the hand and say such a boy deserved to be exalted, and then tell him to come and make his home with him, and sweep out the office and make fires, and run errands, and chop wood, and study law, ind help his wife to do household labours, and have all the balance of the time to play, and get forty cents a month, and be happy. No ; STORY OF THE BAD LITTLE BOY. 33 it would have happened that way in the books, but it didn't happen that way to Jim. No med- dling old clam of a justice dropped in to make trouble, and so the model boy George got thrashed, and Jim was glad of it, because, you know, Jim hated moral boys. Jim said he was down on them milksops. Such, was the coarse language of this bad neglected boy. But the strangest thing that ever happened to Jim was the time he went boating on Sun- day and didn't get drowned, and that other time that he got caught out in the storm when he was fishing on Sunday and didn't get struck by lightning. Why, you might look, and look, and look through the Sunday-School books from now till next Christmas, and you would never come across anything like this. Oh ! no; you would find that all the bad boys who go boating on Sunday invariably get drowned ; and all the bad boys who get caught out in storms when they are fishing on Sunday in- fallibly get struck by lightning. Boats with bad boys in them always upset on Sunday, and it always storms when bad boys go fishing on the Sabbath. How this Jim ever escaped is a mystery to me. This Jim bore a charmed life—that must 34 MARK TWAIN. have been the way of it. Nothing could hurl him. He even gave the elephant in the menagerie a plug of tobacco, and the elephant didn't knock the top of his head off with his trunk. He browsed around the cupboard after essence of peppermint, and didn't make a mis- take and drink aquafortis. He stole his father's gun and went hunting on the Sabbath, and didn't shoot three or four of his fingers off. He struck his little sister on the temple with his fist when he was angry, and she didn't linger in pain through long summer days, and die with sweet words of forgiveness upon her lips that redoubled the anguish of his break- ing heart. No; she got over it. He ran off and went to sea at last, and didn't come back and find himself sad and alone in the world, his loved ones sleeping in the quiet churchyard, and the vine-embowered home of his boyhood tumbled down and gone to decay. Ah! no; he came home drunk as a piper, and got into the station-house the first thing. And he grew up, and married, and raised a large family, and brained them all with an axe one night, and got wealthy by all manner of cheating and rascality; and now he is the in- fernalest wickedest scoundrel in his native STORY OF THE BAD LITTLE BOY. 35 village, and is universally respected, and be- longs to the Legislature. So you see there never was a bad James in the Sunday-School books that had such a streak of luck as this sinful Jim with the charmed life. 36 MARK TWAIN. St. THE SUNDAY SCHOOL. ^ ' TUST about the close of that long, hard winter, said the Sunday-School superintendent, as I was wending toward my duties one brilliant Sabbath morning, I glanced down toward the levee, and there lay the City of Hartford steamer ! No mistake about it: there she was, puffing and panting after her long pilgrimage through the ice. A glad sight? Well, I should say so! And then came a pang right away because I should have to instruct empty benches, sure; the youngsters would all be off welcoming the first steamboat of the season. You can imagine how surprised I was when I opened the door and saw half the benches full! My grati- tude was free, large, and sincere. I re- solved that they should not find me unappre- ciative. I said, e Boys, you cannot think how proud it makes me to see you here, nor what renewed assurance it gives me of your affec tion. I confess that I said to myself, as 1 THE SUNDAY SCHOOL. 37 came along and saw that the City of llartford was in—' ' No ! but is she though ?' And, as quick as any flash of lightning, f stood in the presence of empty benches! 1 had brought them the news myself. 38 MARK TWAIN. VI. POOR HUMAN NATURE. THERE are some natures which never grow large enough to speak out, and say a bad act is a bad act, until they have in- quired into the politics or the nationality of the man who did it. And they are not really scarce, either. Cain is branded a murderer so heartily and unanimously in America only because he was neither a Democrat nor a Republican. The Feejee Islander's abuse of Cain ceased very suddenly when the white man mentioned casually that Cain was a Feejee Islander. The next remark of the savage, after an awkward pause, was, Well, what did Abel come fooling around there for? WIT-INSPIRA T1ONS. VII. WIT-INSPIRATIONS OF THE TWO-YEAR-OLDS. LL infants appear to have an impertinent and disagreeable fashion nowadays of saying Goes the Weasel,' because he'd aiways liked that tune when he was down-hearted, and solemn music made him sad; and when they sung that with tears in their eyes (because they all loved him), and hia F 74 MARK TWAIN. relations grieving around, he just laid there as happy as a bug, and trying to beat time and showing all over how much he enjoyed it; and presently he got worked up and excited, and tried to join in, for mind you he was pretty proud of his abilities in the singing line ; but the first time he opened his mouth and was just going to spread himself his breath took a walk. ei I never see a man snuffed out so sudden. Ah, it was a great loss—it was a powerful loss to this poor little one-horse town. Well, well, well, I hain't got time to be palavering along here—got to nail on the lid and mosey along with him; and-if you'll just give me a lift we'll skeet him into the hearse and meander along. Relations bound to have it so—don't pay no attention to dying injunctions, minute a corpse's gone; but, if I had my way, if I didn't respect his last wishes and tow him be- hind the hearse i'll be cuss'd. I consider that whatever a corpse wants done for his comfort is a little enough matter, and a man hain't got no right to deceive him or take advantage of him; and whatever a corpse trusts me to do I'm a-going to do, you know, even if it's to stuff him and paint him yaller and keep him for a keepsake—you hear me! THE UEDERTAEEL'S STORY. He cracked his whip and went lumbering v\vay with his ancient ruin of a hearse, and I continued my walk with a valuable lesson learned—that a healthy and wholesome cheer- fulness is not necessarily impossible to any occupation. The lesson is likely to be lasting, for it will take many months to obliterate the memory of the remarks and circumstances that' impressed it. 76 MARK TWAIN. XV. A GENERAL REPLY. HEN I was sixteen or seventeen years old a splendid idea burst upon me— a bran-new one, which, had never occurred to anybody before : I would write some pieces and take them down to the editor of the Re- publican, and ask him to give me his plain unvarnished opinion of their value! Now, old and threadbare as the idea was, it was fresh and beautiful to me, and it went flaming and crashing through my system like the genuine lightning and thunder of originality. I wrote the pieces. I wrote them with that placid confidence and that happy facility which only want of practice ■ and absence of literary experience can give. There was not one sen- tence in them that cost half an hour's weighing O O and shaping and trimming and fixing. Indeed, it is possible that there was no one sentence whose mere wording cost even one-sixth of that time. If I remember rightly, there was not one single erasure or interlineation in all that chaste manuscript. [I have since lost A GENERAL REPLY. 77 that large belief in my powers, and likewise that marvellous perfection of execution,! I started down to the "Republican office with my pocket full of manuscripts, my brain full of dreams, and a grand future opening out before me. I knew perfectly well that the editor would be ravished with my pieces. But presently— However, the particulars are of no con- sequence. I was only about to say that a shadowy sort of doubt just then intruded upon my exaltation. Another came, and another. Pretty soon a whole procession of them. And at last, when I stood before the Republican office and looked up at its tall unsympathetic front, it seemed hardly me that could have "chinned its towers ten minutes before, and was now so shrunk up and pitiful that if I dared to step on the gratings I should probably go through. At about that crisis the editor, the very man I had come to consult, came down stairs, and halted a moment to pull at his wristbands and settle his coat to its place, and he happened to notice that I was eyeing him wistfully. He asked me what I wanted. I answered, No- thing! with a boy's own meekness and shame ; and, dropping my eyes, crept humbly 78 MARK TWAIN. round till I was fairly la the alley, and then drew a big grateful breath of relief, and picked up my heels and ran ! I was satisfied. I wanted no more. It was my first attempt to get a "plain unvarnished opinion out of a literary man concerning my compositions, and it has lasted me until now. And in these latter days, whenever I receive a bundle of MS. through the mail, with a request that I will pass judgment upon its merits, I feel like saying to the author, If you had only taken your piece to some grim and stately news- paper office where you did not know anybody, you would not have so fine an opinion of your production as it is easy to see you have now. Every man who becomes editor of a news- paper or magazine straightway begins to receive MSS. from literary aspirants, together with requests that he will deliver judgment upon the same; and after complying in eight or ten instances he finally takes refuge in a gene- ral sermon upon the subject, which he inserts in his publication, and always afterwards refers such correspondents to that sermon for answer. I have at last reached this station in my literary career. I now cease to reply privately to my Applicants for advice, and proceed to construct my public sermon. A GENERAL REELS'. 79 As all letters of the sort 1 am speaking of contain the very same matter, differently worded, I offer as a fair average specimen the last one I have received — f (jo t. 3. :t Mark Twain, Esq. Dear Sir,—I am a youth just out of school and ready to start in life. I have looked around, but don't see anything that suits exactly. Is a literary life easy and profitable, or is it the hard times it is generally put up for ? It must be easier than a good many if not most of the occupations, and I feel drawn to launch out on it, make or break, sink or swim, survive or perish. Now, what are the conditions of success in literature ? You need not be afraid to paint the thing just as it is. I can't do any worse than fail. Everything else offers the same. When I thought of the law—yes, and five or six other professions—I found the same thing was the case every time, viz., all full—overrun — every profession so crammed that success is rendered impossible—too many hands and not enough work. But I must try something, and so I turn at last to litera- ture. Somethings tells me that that is the true beut of my genius, if I have any. I enclose 80 MARK TWAIN. some of my pieces. Will you read them over and give me your candid unbiassed opinion of them? And now I hate to trouble you, but you have been a young man yourself, and what I want is for you to get me a newspaper job of writing to do. You know many newspaper people, and I am entirely unknown. And will you make the best terms you can for me? though I do not expect what might be called high wages at first, of course. AVill you can- didly say what such articles as these I enclose are worth ? I have plenty of them. If you should sell these and let me know, I can send you more as good and may be better than these. An early reply, etc. Yours truly etc. I will answer you in good faith. Whether my remarks shall have great value or not, or my suggestions be worth following, are pro- blems which I take great pleasure in leaving entirely to you for solution. To begin : There are several questions in your letter which only a man's life experience can eventually answer for him—not another man's words. I will simply skip those. 1. Literature, like the ministry, medicine, the law, and all other occupations, is cramped A GENERAL REPLY. 81 and hindered for want of men to do the work, not want of work to do. When people tell you the reverse they speak that which is not true. If you desire to test this you need only hunt up a first-class editor, reporter, business manager, foreman of a shop, mechanic, or artist in any branch of industry, and try to hire him. You will find that he is already hired. He is sober, industrious, capable, and reliable, and is always in demand. He cannot get a day's holiday except by courtesy of his employer, or his city, or the great general public. But if you need idlers, shirkers, half-instructed unambitious and comfort-seeking editors, re- porters, lawyers, doctors, and mechanics, apply anywhere. There are millions of them to be had at the dropping of a handkerchief. 2. No ; I must not and will not venture any opinion whatever as to the literary merit of your productions. The public is the only critic whose judgment is worth anything at all. Do not take my poor word for this, but reflect a moment and take your own. For instance, if Sylvanus Cobb or T. S. Arthur had submitted their maiden MSS. to you, you would have said, with tears in your eyes, "Now, please don't write any more! But you see yourself how popular they are. And 82 MARK TW A IN. if it had been left to you, you would have said the "Marble Faun was tiresome, and that even "Paradise Lost lacked cheerfulness; but you know they sell. Many wiser and better men than you pooh-poohed Shakespeare even as late as two centuries ago, but still that old party has outlived those people. No, I will not sit in judgment upon your literature If I honestly and conscientiously praised it, 1 might thus help to inflict a lingering and pitiless bore upon the public; if I honestly and co nscientiously condemned it, I might thus rob the world of an undeveloped and unsuspected Dickens or Shakespeare. 3. I shrink from l^nting up literary labour for you to do and receive pay for. When- ever your literary productions have proved for themselves that they have a real value, you will never have to go around hunting for re- munerative literary work to do. You will require more hands than you have now, and more brains than you probably ever will have, to do even half the work that will be offered you. Now, in order to arrive at the proof of value hereinbefore spoken of, one needs only to adopt a very simple and certainly very sure process; and that is, to write without fay until somebody offers pay. If nobody offers A GENERAL REPLY. 83 pay within three years, the candidate may look upon this circumstance with the most implicit confidence as the sign that sawing wood is what he was intended for. If he has any wis lorn at all, then he will retire with dignity and assume his heaven-appointed vocation. In the above remarks I have only offered a course of action which Mr. Dickens and most other successful literary men had to follow; but it is a course which will find no sympathy with my client, perhaps. The young literary aspirant is a very, very curious creature. He knows that if he wished to become a tinner the master smith would require him to prove the possession of a good character, and would require him to promise to stay in the shop three years—possibly four—and would make him sweep out and bring water and build fires all the first year, and let him learn to black stoves in the intervals; and for these good honest services would pay him two suits of cheap clothes and his board; and next year he would begin to receive instructions in the trade, and a dollar a week would be added to his emoluments; and two dollars would be added the third year, and three the fourth, and then, if he had become a first-rate tinner, 84 MARK TWAIN. he would get about fifteen or twenty, or may be thirty dollars a week, with never a possi- bility of getting seventy-five while he lived. If he wanted to become a mechanic of any other kind he would have to undergo this same tedious ill-paid apprenticeship. If he wanted to become a lawyer or a doctor he would have fifty times worse, for he would get nothing at all during his long apprenticeship, and in addition would have to pay a large sum for tuition, and have the privilege of boarding and clothing himself. The literary aspirant knows all this, and yet he has the hardihood to present himself for reception into the literary guild, and ask to share its high honours and emoluments, without a single twelvemonth's apprenticeship to show in excuse for his pre- sumption! He would smile pleasantly if he were asked to make even so simple a thing as a ten-cent tin dipper without previous instruc- tion in the art; but, all green and ignorant, wordy, pompously assertive, ungrammatical, and with a vague distorted knowledge of men and the world acquired in a back country village, he will serenely take up so dangerous a weapon as a pen, and attack the most for- midable subject that finance, commerce, war, or politics can furnish him withal. It would be A GENERAL REPLY. 85 laughable if it were not so sad and so pitiable. The poor fellow would not intrude upon the tin shop without an apprenticeship, but is willing to seize and wield with unpractised hand an instrument which is able to overthrow dynasties, change religions, and decree the weal or woe of nations. If my correspondent will write free of charge for the newspapers of his neighbourhood, it will be one of the strangest things that ever happened if he does not get all the employment he can attend to on those terms. And as soon as ever his writings are worth money plenty of people will hasten to offer it. And, by way of serious and well-meant en- couragement, I wish to urge upon him once more the truth, that acceptable writers for the press are so scarce that book and periodical publishers are seeking them constantly, and with a vigilance that never grows heedless for a moment. MAPiK TWAIN XVI. AN ENTERTAINING ARTICLE. T TAKE the following paragraph from an -*■ article in the Boston Advertiser:— An English Critic on Mark Twain.— Perhaps the most successful flights of the humour of Mark Twain have been descrip- tions of the persons who did not appreciate his humour at all. We have become familial with the Californians who were thrilled with terror by his burlesque of a newspaper re- porter's way of telling a story, and we have heard of the Pennsylvania clergyman who sadly returned his Innocents Abroad to the book-agent with the remark that Y a Sandwich Island paper (the "Commercial Advertiser") I learned that H. M. Whitney, its able editor and proprietor for sixteen years, was just retiring from business, having sold out to younger men. I take this opportunity of thanking the disappearing veteran for courtesies done and information afforded me in bygone days. Mr. Whitney is one of the fairest- minded and best-hearted cannibals I ever knew, if I do say it myself. There is not a stain upon his name, and never has been. And he is the best judge of a human being I ever saw go through a market. Many a time I have seen natives try to palm off part of an old person on him for the fragment of a youth, but I never saw it succeed. Ah, no, there was no deceiving H. M. Whitney. He could tell the very family a roast came from if he had ever tried the family before. I remember his arresting my hand once and saying, "Let that alone—it's from one of those Hulahulas—a A SANDWICH ISLAND EDITOR. 121 very low family—and tough. I cannot think of Whitney without my mouth watering. We used to eat a great many people in those halcyon days, which shall come again, alas ! never more. We lived on the fat of the land. And I will say this for Henry AVhitney—he never thought less of his friend after examining into him, and he was always sorry when his enemy was gone. Most of the above may fairly and justly rank as nonsense, but my respiect and regard for Mr. Whitney are genuine. 122 MARK TWAIN. XXIII. THE PORTRAIT. T NEVER can look at those periodical por- traits in your magazine without feeling a wild, tempestuous ambition to be an artist. I hare seen thousands and thousands of pictures in my time—acres of them here, and leagues of them in the galleries of Europe—but never any that moved me as the magazine por- traits do. There is the portrait of Monsignore Capel in the November number; now, could anything be sweeter than that? And there was Bis- march's in the October number; who can look at that without being purer and stronger and nobler for it ? And Thurlow Weed's pic- ture in the September number; I would not have died without seeing that—no, not for any- thing this world can give. Bat look back still further, and recall my own likeness as printed in the August issue; if I had been in my grave a thousand years when that appeared I would have got up and visited the artist. I sleep with all these portraits under my TEE PORTRAIT. 121 pillow every night, so that I can go on study- ing them as soon as the day dawns in the morning. I know them all as thoroughly as if I had made them myself; I know every line and mark about them. Sometimes when com- pany are present I shuffle the portraits all up together, and then pick them out one by one5 and call their names without referring to the printing at the bottom. I seldom make a mis- take—never when I am calm. I have had the portraits framed for a long time, waiting till my aunt gets everything ready for hanging them up in the parlour. But first one thing and then another inter- feres, and so the thing is delayed. Once she said they would have more of the peculiar kind of light they needed in the attic. The old simpleton ! it is as dark as a tomb up there. But she does not know anything about art, and so she has no reverence for it. When I showed her my Map of the Fortifications of Paris she said it was rubbish. Well, from nursing those magazine portraits so long I have come at last to have a perfect infatuation for art. I have a teacher now, and my enthusiasm continually and tumultuously grows as I learn to use with more and more facility the pencil, brush, and graver. I am 124 MARK TWAIN. studying under De Melville, the house and portrait painter. (His name w as Smith when he lived West.) He does any kind of artist work a body wants, having a genius that is universal, like Michael Angelo. Resembles that great artist, in fact. The back of his head is like his, and he wears his hat-brim tilted down on his nose to expose it. I have been studying under De Melville several months now. The first month I painted fences, and gave general satisfaction. The next month I whitewashed a barn. The third, I was doing tin roofs; the fourth, common signs; the fifth, statuary to stand before cigar shops. This present month is only the sixth, and I am already in portraits ! The humble offering which accompanies these remarks—the portrait of His Majesty William III., King of Prussia—is my fifth at- tempt in portraits, and my greatest success. It has received unbounded praise from all classes of the community, but that which grati- fies me most is the frequent and cordial verdict that it resembles the magazine portraits. Those were my first love, my earliest admiration, he original source and incentive of my art- tmbition. Whatever I am in Art to-day I awe to the magazine portraits. I ask no credit THE PORTRAIT. 125 for myself - I deserve none. And I never take any, either. Many a stranger has come to my exhibition (for I have had my portrait of King William on exhibition at one dollar a ticket)., and would have gone away blessing 126 MARK TWAIN me if I had let him, but I never did. I always stated where I got the idea. King William wears large bushy side whis- liers, and some critics have thought that this portrait would be more complete if they were added. But it was not possible. There was not room for side whiskers and epaulettes both, and so I let the whiskers go, and put in the epaulettes for the sake of style. That thing on his hat is an eagle. The Prussian eagle— -it is a national emblem. When I say hat I mean helmet; but it seems impossible to make a picture of a helmet that a body can have confidence in. I wish kind friends everywhere would aid me in my endeavour to attract a little atten- tion to the magazine portraits I feel per- suaded it can be accomplished if the course to be pursued be chosen with judgment. I write for that magazine all the time, and so do many abler men, and if I can get the portraits into universal favour it is all 1 ask; the reading matter will take care of itself. COMMENDATIONS OF THE PORTRAIT. There is nothing like it in the Vatican. Pius IX. THE PORTRAIT. 127 It has none of that vagueness, that dreamy spirituality about it, which many of the first critics of Arkansas have objected to in the first Murillo school of Art. Ruskin. The expression is very interesting. J. W. Titian. (Keeps a macaroni store in Venice, at the old family stand.) It is the neatest thing in still life I have seen for years. Rosa Bonheue. The smile may be almost called unique. Bismarck. I never saw such character portrayed in a pictured face before. De Melville. There is a benignant simplicity about the execution of this work which warms the heart toward it as much, full as much, as it fascinates the eye. Land seer. One cannot see it without longing to con- template the artist. Frederick William. 128 MARK TWAIN. Send me the entire edition—together with the plate and the original portrait—and name your own price. And—would you like to come over and stay a while with Napoleon at Wilhelmshohe ? It shall not cost you a cent. William III. u DOGGEREL. m XXIY. DOGGEREL/ MINNESOTA correspondent empties the following anecdotes into the drawer of this Memoranda. The apparently im- possible feat described in the second one is not common, and therefore the rarity of the situation commends it to this department of this magazine, and will no doubt secure the sympathy of the reader. The correspondent saj's— A few months ago S. and myself had occa- sion to make a trip up the Missouri. While waiting at Sioux City for a boat we saw some of those white Esquimaux dogs, and S. became possessed of the idea that it was necessary for his happiness that he should have one of the breed; so we hunted up the proprietor and opened negotiations. We found that he had none to spare at the time, but that he expected some puppies would be born to the world in a month or six weeks. That suited S. well enough, as he expected to return to Sioux 130 MARK TWAIN. City in about three months, and a bargain was struck. Well, we came back; but S. had by that time got out of conceit of the dog, and did not want him. I insisted on his sticking to the bargain, and succeeded in getting him and the proprietor of the dogs together. "Mr. W., said I, "when we were here some three months ago you promised to save for us an Esquimaux puppy. Were any born ? Oh, yaw ; de buppies vas born Well, have you got one for us ? Nein, I don't got any. Why, how is that ? You remember you promised to save one. Well, mine vriend, I'll tell how it vas [confidentially, and drawing close]. Now you see de buppy dog he live in de shtable mit de horse, and [very pathetically] de horse he got step-ped on to de do-ag, and de do-ag he got di-ed. And thus it was that S. did notget his puppy, but I made him engage another. While up the river I heard the following story, showing how an animal can rise, when necessary, superior to its nature:— DOGGEREL. 151 You see, said the narrator, the beaver took to the water, and the dog was after him. First the beaver was ahead, and then the dog. It was tuck and nip whether the dog would catch the beaver, and nuck and tip whether the beaver would catch the dog. Finally the beaver got across the river, and the dog had almost caught him when, phit! up the beaver skun up a tree. But, said a bystander, beavers can't climb trees. "A beaver can't climo a tree ? By gosh, he had to climb a tree, the dog was a erowdin' him so! 132 »>>> RK TWAIN. XXV MEAN PEOPLE. "|\/TY ancient comrade Doesticks, in a L letter from New York, quotes a printed paragraph concerning a story I used to tell to lecture audiences about a wonderfully mean man whom I used to know, and then Mr. D. throws himself into a passion and relates the following circumstance (writing on both sides of his paper, which is at least singular in a journalist, if not profane and indecent) :— Now, I don't think much of that. I know a better thing about old Captain Asa T. Mann of this town. You see, old Mann used to own and command a pickaninny, bull-headed, mud- turtle-shaped craft of a schooner that hailed from Perth Amboy. Old Mann used to prance out of his little cove where he kept his three- cent craft, and steal along the coast of the dangerous Kill von Kull, on the larboard side of Staten Island, to smouch oysters from un- guarded beds, or pick clams off sloops where the watch had gone to bed drunk. Well, once old Mann went on a long voyage for MEAN PEOPLE. 133 him. He went down to Virginia, taking his wife and little boy with him. The old rap- scallion put on all sorts of airs, and pretended to keep up as strict discipline as if liis craft was a man-of-war. One day his darling baby tumbled overboard. A sailor named Jones jumped over after him, and after cavorting around about an hour or so succeeded in get- ting the miserable little scion of a worthless sire on board again. Then old Mann got right up on his dignity—he put on all the dig. he had handy—and in two minutes he had Jones into double irons, and there he kept him three weeks, in the forehold, for leaving the ship without orders. I will not resurrect my own mean man, for possibly he might not show to good advantage in the presence of this gifted sailor ; but I will enter a Toledo bridegroom against the son of the salt wave, and let the winner take the money. I give the Toledo story just as it comes to me. (It, too, is written on both sides of the paper; but as this correspondent is not a journalist, the act is only wicked, not ob- scene.) In this village there lived, and continue to live, two chaps who in their bachelor days were chums. S., one of the chaps, tiring of 134 MARK TWAIN. single blessedness, took unto himself a wife and a wedding, with numerous pieces of silver- ware and things from congratulating friends. C., the other chap, sent in a handsome silver ladle, costing several dollars or more. Their friendship continued. A year later C. also entered into partnership for life with one of the tair Eves; and he also had a wed- ding. S., being worth something less than 20,000 dollars, thought he ought to return the compliment of a wedding present, and a happy thought struck him. He took that ladle down to the jeweller from whom it was purchased by C. the year before, and traded it off for silver salt dishes to present to C« and his bride ANSWER TO AN INQUIRY. 135 XXYI. ANSWER TO AN INQUIRY FROM THE COMING MAN. 4 4 T7-0UNG AUTHOR."—Yes, Agassiz does recommend authors to eat fish, because the phosphorus in it makes brains. So far you are correct. But I cannot help you to a decision about the amount you need to eat—at least, not with certainty. If the specimen composition you send is about your fair usual average, I should judge that per- haps a couple of whales would be all you would want for the present. Not the largest kind, but simply good middling-sized whales 13C> MARK TWAIN. XXVII. THE DANGER OF LYING IN BED. THE man in the ticket-office said, Have an accident-insurance ticket, also ? No, I said, after studying the matter over a little. No, I believe not; I am going to be travelling by rail all day to-day. How- ever, to-morrow I don't travel. Give me one for to-morrow. The man looked puzzled. He said— But it is for accident insurance, and if you are going to travel by rail If I am going to travel by rail I shan't need it. Lying at home in bed is the thing 1 am afraid of. I had been looking into this matter. Last year I travelled twenty thousand miles, almost entirely by rail; the year before, I travelled over twenty-five thousand miles, half by sea and half by rail; and the year before that I travelled in the neighbourhood of ten thou- sand miles, exclusively by rail. I suppose, if I put in all the little odd journeys here and THE DANGER OE LYING IN BED. 137 there, I may say I have travelled sixty thou- sand miles during the three years I have men- tioned, and never an accident. For a good while I said to myself every morning, Now, I have escaped thus far, and so the chances are just that much increased that I shall catch it this time. I will be shrewd, and buy an accident ticket. And to a dead moral certainty I drew a blank, and went to bed that night without a joint started or a bone splintered. I got tired of that sort of daily bother, and fell to buying accident tickets that were good for a month. I said to myself, A man can't buy thirty blanks in one bundle. But I was mistaken. There was never a prize in the lot. I could read of railway accidents every day—the newspaper atmo- sphere was foggy with them; but somehow they never came my way. I found I had spent a good deal of money in the accident business, and had nothing to show for it. My suspi- cions were aroused, and I began to hunt around for somebody that had won in this lottery. I found plenty of people who had invested, but not an individual that had ever had an accident or made a cent. I stopped buying accident tickets and went to ciphering. The K 138 MARK TWAIN. result was astounding. The peril lay not in travelling, but in staying at home. I hunted up statistics, and was amazed to find that, after all the glaring newspaper head- ings concerning railroad disasters, less than three hundred people had really lost their lives by those disasters in the preceding twelve months. The Erie road was set down as the most murderous in the list. It had killed forty-six — or twenty-six, I do not exactly remember which, but I know the number was double that of any other road. But the fact straightway suggested itself that the Erie was an immensely long road, and did more busi- ness than any other line in the country; so the double number of killed ceased to be matter for surprise. By further figuring it appeared, that be- tween New York and Rochester the Erie ran eight passenger-trains each way every day— sixteen altogether, and carried a daily average of 6000 persons. That is about a million in six months—the population of New Yerk city. Well, the Erie kills from thirteen to twenty- three persons out of its million in six months; and in the same time 13,000 of New York's million die in their beds! My flesh ciept, my the danger of lying in bed. 139 hair stood on end. This is appalling ! I said. The danger isn't in travelling by rail, but in trusting to those deadly beds. I will never sleep in a bed again. I had figured on considerably less than one- half the length of the Erie road. It was plain that the entire road must transport at least eleven or twelve thousand people every day. There are many short roads running out of Boston that do fully half as much; a great many such roads. There are many roads scat- tered about the Union that do a prodigious passenger business. Therefore it was fair to presume that an average of 2500 passengers a day for each road in the country would t about correct. There are 846 railway lines in our country, and 846 times 2500 are 2,115,000. So the railways of America move more than two millions of people every day; six hundred and fifty millions of people a year, without counting the Sundays. They do that, too, there is no question about it; though where they get the raw material is clear be- yond the jurisdiction of my arithmetic ; for I have hunted the census through and through, and I find that there are not that many people in the United States by a matter of six hun- dred and ten millions at the very least. They 140 MARK TWAIN. must use some of the same people over again, likely. San Francisco is one-eighth as populous as New York; there are 60 deaths a week in the former and 500 a week in the latter—if they have luck. That is, 3120 deaths a year in San Francisco, and eight times as many in New York—say about 25,000 or 26,000. The health of the two places is the same. So we will let it stand as a fair presumption that this will hold good all over the country, and that consequently 25,000 out of every million of people we have must die every year. That amounts to one-fortieth of our total population. One million of us, then, die annually. Out of this million ten or twelve thousand are stabbed, shot, drowned, hanged, poisoned, or meet a similarly violent death in some other popular way, such as perishing by kerosene lamp and hoop-skirt conflagrations, getting buried in coal-mines, falling off housetops, breaking through church or lecture-room floors, taking patent medicines, or committing suicide in other forms. The Erie railroad kills from £3 to 46 ; the other 845 railroads kill an average of one-third of a man each; and the rest of that million, amounting in the aggregate to the appalling figure of nine hundred and TEE DANGER OF LYING IN BED. 141 eighty-seven thousand six hundred and thirty- one corpses, die naturally in their beds ! You will excuse me from taking any more chances 011 those beds. The railroads are £ood enough for me. And my advice to all people is, Don't stay at home any more than you can help; but when you have got to stay at home a while, buy a package of those insurance tickets and sit up nights. You cannot be too cautious. (One can see now why I answered that ticket agent in the manner recorded at the top of this sketch.) The moral of this composition is, that thoughtless people grumble more than is fair about railroad management in the United States. When we consider that every day and night of the year full fourteen thousand railway trains of various kinds, freighted with life and armed with death, go thundering over the land, the marvel is, not that they kill three hundred human beings in a twelvemonth, but that they do not kill three hundred times three hundred! 142 MARK TWAIN XXVIII. ALMOST INCREDIBLE—TRUE STORY OF CHICAGO. HEN my friend McCracken told me that he left hi? wife and went to Chi- cago, I knew at once what his object must have been. He went for a divorce. As soon as he reached the city, and before he was fairly out of the railroad depot, he ws. attacked by a score of small boys who pressed upon him the cards of various lawyers, and assailed him with shouts of "Want a divorce, mister ? Here you are: divorce you in fifteen minutes ! and such like astounding cries. McCracken was quite appalled by this babel of noises, and, instinctively clutching a card from the most persistent boy, sought refuge in the nearest hotel, and, procuring a room, locked himself in. Then he sank into a chair and proceeded to read the card. It was profuse in its promises of relief to the embarrassed reader. The gentleman whose name was appended to it styled himself an TRUE STORY OF CHICAGO. 143 agent, and not only promised to divorce everybody who wished his services, and to send them new wives—C. 0. D.—but also adver- tised that he executed murders with prompt- ness and despatch, and that he had poisons of every variety always on hand. Of course McCracken did not expect to find ■ Chicago a moral place—no one in his senses commits that mistake—but he was astonished at the style of advertising which appeared to be in vogue among its citizens. It immediately occurred to him that it would be advisable for him to go armed while in the city, and so, repeating to himself the ancient pro- verb— Thrice may he quarrel who is justly armed, rose up and rang the bell. A pretty chambermaid answered his sum- mons, and asking him what he wanted, re- quested him to be in a hurry, as she had a divorce suit coming on in court in a few mo- ments, and didn't wish to lose it, as she had done in three or four instances, through not being present. u I want to know where I can find an arm- shop, replied McCracken, mildly. Arm-shop 9 repeated the young woman 144 MARK TWAIN. in an inquiring tone of voice. I don't exactly know what you mean. If it is the other thing [and here she looked modestly down upon the floor] you want to see, why the Opery House is just around the corner. Opei'a House! repeated McCracken, completely puzzled in his turn, why, what do you think I mean ? Nothing, sir, was the reply; only they're playing ' Undine' at the Opery House, and some folks call it the leg shop, and I didn't know but what, being a stranger here, you didn't like to ask right out for it. This little misunderstanding was soon cleared up, and following the directions of the cham- bermaid, McCracken found himself in an arm- shop, which bore above its door the strange announcement Licensed to Shoot on the Premises. Stating his business to the proprietor, he was immediately shown a new patent revolver, which he was assured was the very best wea- pon of its kind then in the market. No less than two hundred and twenty of our most respectable citizens have been shot with that kind of pistol during the past fortnight, said this man to McCracken, and I can promise you it will give you complete satisfaction. I TRUE STORY OF CHICAGO. 145 will just show you how it acts. So saying, the man stepped to the door, and taking aim at a quiet-looking old gentleman on the other side of the street, fired and killed him in- stantly. "Works well, doesn't it? said the man, turning smilingly towards my horror-stricken friend, who could only gasp out in broken ac- cents, Help! Police! Murder! and simi- lar cheerful remarks. It's all right, said the pistol-man reassur- ingly. I've got a licence to shoot on these premises, and I kill fourteen or fifteen people a day, when business is brisk. Why, bless you! we don't think anything of shooting a man in Chicago. My friend stayed no longer, but, rushing wildly from the shop, hurried toward the rail- way depot at a double-quick pace. On his way he passed four dead men who were lying on the ground, fell over a pair of fellows who were struggling together and stabbing each other on the side walk, and was more than once forced to turn down alleys in order to avoid free fights which were raging on the street. He bought his ticket and seated himself in the cars, glad to return to our innocent metro- polis. 146 MARK TWAIN. XXIX. A TRAVELLING SHOW. HERE was a fellow travelling around in that country, said Mr. Nickerson, with a moral-religious show—a sort of scriptural panorama—and he hired a wooden-headed old slab to play the piano for him. After the first night's performance the showman says— My friend, you seem to know pretty much all the tunes there are, and you worry along first rate. But then, don't you notice that sometimes last night the piece you happened to be playing was a little rough on the pro- prietors, so to speak—didn't seem to jibe with the general gait of the picture that was passing at the time, as it were—was a little foreign to the subject, you know—as if you didn't either trump or follow suit, you understand ? Well, no, the fellow said ; he hadn't noticed, but it might be ; he had played along just as it came handy. So they put it up that the simple old dummy was to keep his eye on the panorama after that, and as soon as a stunning picture A TRAVELLING SHOW. 147 was reeled out, he was to fit it to a dot with a piece of music that would help the audience to get the idea of the subject, and warm them up like a camp-meeting revival. That sort of thing would corral their sympathies, the show man saia. There was a big audience that night—mostly middle-aged and old people who belong to the church, and took a strong interest in Bible matters, and the balance were pretty much young bucks and heifers—they always come out strong on panoramas, you know, because it gives them a chance to taste one another's mug in the dark. Well, the showman began to swell himself up for his lecture, and the old mud-dobber tackled the piano and ran his fingers up and down once or twice to see that she was all right, and the fellows behind the curtain commenced to grind out the panorama. The showman balanced his weight on his right foot, and propped his hands over his hips, and flung his eyes over his shoulder at the scenery, and said— "Ladies and gentlemen, the painting now before you illustrates the beautiful and touch- ing parable of the Prodigal Son. Observe the happy expression just breaking over the 148 MARK TWAIN. features of the poor suffering youth—so worn and weary with his long march ; note also the ecstasy beaming from the uplifted countenance of the aged father, and the joy that sparkles in the eyes of the excited group of youths and maidens, and seems ready to burst into the welcoming chorus from their lips. The lesson, my friends, is as solemn and instructive as the story is tender and beautiful. The mud-dobber was all ready, and when the second speech was finished, struck up— Oh, we'll all get blind drunk, When Johnny comes marching home!* Some of the people giggled, and some groaned a little. The showman couldn't say a word; he looked at the pianist sharp, but he was all lovely and serene—he didn't know there was anything out of gear. The panorama moved on, and the showman drummed up his grit and started in fresh. "Ladies and gentlemen, the fine picture now unfolding itself to your gaze exhibits one of the most notable events in Bible history— our Saviour and his disciples upon the Sea of Galilee. How grand, how awe-inspiring are the reflections which the subject invokes! What sublimity of faith is revealed to us io A TRAVELLING SHOW. 149 this lesson from the sacred writings ? The Saviour rebukes the angry waves, and walks securely upon the bosom of the deep ! All around the house they were whispering, Oh, how lovely, how beautiful! and the orchestra let himself out again— A life on the ocean wave, And a home on the rolling deep ! There was a good deal of honest snickering turned on this time, and considerable groan- ing, and one or two old deacons got up and went out. The showman grated his teeth, and cursed the piano man to himself, but tne fellow sat there like a knot on a log, and seemed to think he was doing first-rate. After things got quiet the showman thought he would make one more stagger at it any way, though his confidence was beginning to get mighty shaky. The supes started the panorama grinding along again, and he says : Ladies and gentlemen, this exquisite painting represents the raising o£ Lazarus from the dead by our Saviour. The subject has been handled with marvellous skill by the artist, and such touching sweetness and tenderness of expression has he thrown into it that I have known peculiarly sensitive 150 MAtiK TWAIN. persons to be even affected to tears by looking at it. Observe the half-confused half-inquir- ing look upon the countenance of the awakened Lazarus. Observe, also, the attitude and ex- nression of the Saviour, who takes him gently by the sleeve of his shroud with one hand, while he points with the other toward the distant city. Before anybody could get off an opinion in the case the innocent old ass at the piano struck up— ,! Come, rise up, William Rid-d-ley, And go along with me ! It was rough on the audience, you bet. All the solemn old flats got up in a huff to go, and everybody else laughed till the windows rattled. The showman went down and grabbed the orchestra and shook him up, and says— That lets you out, you know, you chowder- headed old clam I - Go to the door-keeper and get your money, and cut your stick—vamose the ranche! Ladies and gentlemen, circum- stances over which I have no control compel me prematurely to dismiss. ON CHILDREN. 151 XXX. ON CHILDREN. HOW TO TRAIN UP A CHILD. TT AYING reflected deeply for half an hour **• upon the subject of domestic discipline, I feel like sparing a few suggestions relative to the best method of bringing up children. Being a bachelor without children, my sugges- tions are as likely to be disinterested as if I had never seen a child. According to my observation the most difficult time to bring up children is in the morning. You do, sometimes, though seldom, bring them up in the morning by yelling at them ? but the effectiveness of this process diminishes with its repetition, even when not entirely neutralised by the children's trick of stopping their ears with the bedclothes. The only prompt, effective, and absolutely reliable method is to bring them up by the hair. If your child has a good healthy scalp, without any tendency to premature baldness, this method will work with most gratifying efficiency. Try it about once a week, and 152 MARK TWA1JS. you will be surprised to observe how its in- fluence will extend through the six days' interval, inspiring your child with the liveliest possible interest in the resplendent pageantry of sunrise. To bring up a darling child by the hair requires the exercise of some energy and firm- ness, but no affectionate parent will hesitate at any little sacrifice of this kind for the welfare of his offspring. Nothing can be more fatal to your discipline than to allow your children to contradict you. If you happen to be betrayed into any mis- statement or exaggeration in their presence, don't permit them to correct you. Right or wrong, you must obstinately insist on your infallibility, and promptly suppress every symptom of puerile scepticism, with force if need be. The moment you permit them to doubt your unerring wisdom you will begin to forfeit their respect and pander to their conceit. There can be no sadder spectacle than a parent surrounded by olive-branches who think they know more than he does. I vividly remember how my father—who was one of the most rigid and successful of disciplinarians—quelled the aspiring egotism that prompted me to correct his careless re- ON CHILDREN. 153 mark (when he was reckoning a problem in shillings) that five times twelve was sixty-two and a half. So, said he, climbing over his spectacles, and surveying me grimly, "ye think ye know more'n your father, hey ? Come 'ere to me! His invitation was too pressing to be de- clined, and for a few excruciating moments I reposed in bitter humiliation across his left knee, with my neck in the embrace of his left arm. I didn't see him demonstrate his mathe- matical accuracy with the palm of his right hand on the largest patch of my trousers, but I felt that the old man was right; and when, after completely eradicating my faith in the multiplication table, he asked me how much five times twelve was, I insisted, with tears in my eyes, that it was sixty-two and a half. That's right! he said ; I'll larn ye to respect yer father if I have to thrash ye twelve times a day. Now go'n water them hosses, 'n be lively, too. The old gentleman didn't permit my respect for him to wane much until the inflammatory rheumatism disabled him, and even then he continued to inspire me with awe until I was thoroughly convinced that his disability wa* 154 Mark twain. permanent. Unquestioning obedience is the crowning grace of childhood. When you tell your child to do anything and lie stops to in- quire why, it is advisable to kindly but firmly fetch him a rap across the ear, and inform him "that's why! He will soon get into the way of starting with charming alacrity at the word of command. • One of the most inveterate and annoying traits of children is inquisitiveness : if you are inconsiderate enough to attempt to gratify their omnivorous curiosity you may as well prepare to abdicate, for you will be nonplussed by their questions a dozen times a day, and in a week your sagacity will be hopelessly compromised. An average child is a magazine of unanswerable o cj disconcerting conundrums. You can't expect children to have much reverence for a parent whose ignorance they can expose twice out of three times trying. It is well enough to answer an easy question now and then, just to convince them that you can when you choose; but when they come to you with a poser, tell them, Oh, you never mind ! or a Shut up ! and then they will grow up independent and self- reliant, and restrained only by veneration from splitting your head open — to find out how it holds so much information without letting- ON CHILDREN. 155 some out. It would be difficult—very diffi- cult — to estimate the beneficial effect that would be entailed upon their children if parents generally would adopt the method here vaguely indicated. . 156 MARK TWAIN. XXXI. TRAIN UP A CHILD, AND AWAY HE GOES. ES, I've had a good many fights in my manipulating his dismantled rose, and it's kind of queer too, for when I was a boy the old man was telling me better. He was a good man, and hated fighting. When I would come home with my nose bleeding or my face scratched up, he used to call me out in the woodshed, and in a sorrowful and discouraged way say, c So, Johnny, you've had another fight, hey ? How many times have I got to tell ye how disgraceful and wicked it is for boys to fight ? It was only yesterday that I talked to you an hour about the sin of fighting, and here you've been at it again. Who was it with this time ? With Tommy Kelly, hey ? Don't you know any better than to fight a boy that weighs twenty pounds more than you do, beside being two years older ? Ain't ye got a spark of sense about ye ? I can see plainly that you are determined to break your poor time, said old John Parky, tenderly ON CHILDREN. 157 father's heart by your reckless conduct. What alls your finger ? Tommy bit it! Drat the little fool! Didn't ye know enough to keep your finger out of his mouth ? Was trying to jerk his cheek off, hey ? Won't ye never learn to quit foolin' 'round a boy's mouth with yer finger? You're bound to disgrace us all by such wretched behaviour. You're determined never to be nobody ! Did you ever hear of Isaac Watts—that wrote Let dogs delight to bark and bite"—sticking his fingers in a boy's mouth to get 'em bit, like a fool ? I'm clean discouraged with ye. Why didn't ye go for his nose, the way Jonathan Edwards, and George Washington, ana Dan'l Webster used to, when they was boys! Could'nt, 'cause he had ye down ! That's a purty story to tell me. It does beat all that you can't learn how Socrates and William Penn used to gouge when they was under, after the hours and hours I've spent telling you about those great men! It seems to me sometimes as if I should have to give you up in despair. It's an awful trial to me to have a boy that don't pay any attention to good example, nor to what I say. What! you pulled out three or four handfuls of his hair? H-m! Did he squirm any? Now, if you'd a give him one or two in the 158 MARK TWAIN. eye—but, as I've told you many a time, fight- ing is poor business. Won't you—for your father's sake—won't you promise to try and remember that! H-m! Johnny, how did it —ahem—which licked ? You licked him ! Sho! Really? Well, now, I hadn't any idea you could lick that Tommy Kelly! I don't believe John Bunyan at ten years old could have done it. Johnny, my boy, you can't think how I hate to have you fighting every day or two. I wouldn't have had him lick you for five—no, not for ten dollars. Now, sonny, go right in and wash up, and tell yer mother to put a rag on yer finger. And, Johnny, don't let me hear of your fighting again!' O I never see anybody so down on fighting as the old man was; but, somehow, he never could break me from it,'' ABOUT BARB BUS. 159 XXXII. ABOUT BARBERS. A LL things change except barbers, the ^ ways of barbers, and the surroundings of barbers. These never change. What one experiences in a barber-shop the first time he enters one is what he always experiences in barber-shops afterwards till the end of his days. I got shaved this morning as usual. A man approached the door from Jones Street as I approached it from Main—a thing that always happens. I hurried up, but it was of no use; he entered the door one little step ahead of me, and I followed in on his heels and saw him take the only vacant chair, the one presided over by the best barber. It always happens so. I sat down, hoping that I might fall heir to the chair belonging to the better of the remaining two barbers, for he had already begun combing his man's hair, while his com- rade was not yet quite done rubbing up and oiling his customer's locks. I watched the probabilities with strong interest. When I saw that No, 2 was gaining on No, 1 my 160 MARK TWAIN. interest grew to solicitude. When No. 1 stopped a moment to make change on a bath ticket for a new-comer, and lost ground in the race, my solicitude rose to anxiety. When No. 1 caught up again, and both he and his comrade Avere pulling the towels aAvay and brushing the powder from their customers' cheeks, and it was about an even thing Avhicli one would say "Next! first, my very breath stood still Avith the suspense. But Avhen at the final culminating moment No. 1 stopped to pass a comb a couple of times through his cus- tomer's eyebrows, I saAV that he had lost the race by a single instant, and I rose indignant and quitted the shop, to keep from falling into the hands of No. 2; for I have none of that enviable firmness that enables a man to look calmly into the eyes of a waiting barber and tell him he Avill wait for his fellow-barber's chair. I stayed out fifteen minutes, and then Avent back, hoping for better luck. Of course all the chairs Avere occupied now, and four men sat Avaiting, silent, unsociable, distraught, and looking bored, as men always do avIio are aAvaiting their turn in a barber's shop. I sat down in one of the iron-armed compartments of an old sofa, and put in the time for a while, reading the framed advertisements of all sorts ABOUT BARBERS. 161 of quack nostrums for dyeing and colouring the hair. Then I read the greasy names on the pri- vate bay rum bottles; read the names and noted the numbers on the private shaving cups in the pigeon-holes; studied the stained and damaged cheap prints on the walls, of battles, early Presidents, and voluptuous recumbent sul- tanas, and the tiresome and everlasting young girl putting her grandfather's spectacles on ; execrated in my heart the cheerful canary and the distracting parrot that few barber-shops are without. Finally, I searched out the least dilapi- dated oflast3Tear's illustrated papers that littered the foul centre-table, and conned their unjusti- fiable misrepresentations of old forgotten events. At last my turn came. A voice said Next! and I surrendered to—No. 2, of course. It always happens so. I said meekly that I was in a hurry, and it affected him as strongly as if he had never heard it. He shoved up my head, and put a napkin under it. He ploughed his fingers into my collar and fixed a towel there. He explored my hair with his claws and suggested that it needed trimming. I said I did not want it trimmed. He explored again and said it was pretty long for the present style—better have a little taken off; it needed it behind especially. I said I had had it cut 162 MARK TWAIN. only a week before. He yearned over it re- flectively a moment, and then asked, with a disparaging manner, who cut it ? I came back at him promptly with a "You did! I had him there. Then he fell to stirring up his lather and regarding himself in the glass, stop- ping now and then to get close and examine his chin critically or torture a pimple. Then he lathered one side of my face thoroughly, and was about to lather the other, when a dog- fight attracted his attention, and he ran to the window and stayed and saw it out, losing two shillings on the result in bets with the other barbers, a thing which gave me great satis- faction. He finished lathering, meantime get- ting the brush into my mouth only twice, and then began to rub in the suds with his hand; and as he now had his head turned, discussing the dog-fight with the other barbers, he natu- rally shovelled considerable lather into my mouth without knowing it, but I did. He now began to sharpen his razor on an old suspender, and was delayed a good-^il on ac~ count of a controversy about £ cheap mas- querade ball he had figured at the night before, m red cambric and bogus ermine, as some kind of a king. He was so gratified with being chaffed about some damsel whom he had smif- ABOUT BARBERS. 163 ten with his charms that he used every means to continue the controversy by pretending to be annoyed at the chaffings of his fellows. This matter begot more surveyings of himself in the glass, and he put down his razor and brushed his hair with elaborate care, plastering an inverted arch of it down on his forehead, accomplishing an accurate "part behind, and brushing the two wings forward over his ears with nice exactness. In the mean time the lather was drying on my face, and apparently eating into my vitals. Now he began to shave, digging his fingers into my countenance to stretch the skin, making a handle of my nose now and then, bundling and tumbling my head this way and that as conveni- euce in shaving demanded, and hawking and expectorating pleasantly all the while. As long as he was on the tough sides of my face I did not suffer; but when he began to rake, and rip, and tug at my chin, the tears came. I did not mind his getting so close down to me; I did not mind his garlic, because all barbers eat garlic, I suppose; but there was an added something that made me fear that he was decaying in- wardly while still alive, and this gave me much concern. He now put his finger into my piouth to assist him in shaving the corners of 164 MARK TWAIN. my upper lip, and it was by this bit of circuin- stantial evidence that I discovered that a part of his duties in the shop was to clean the kerosene lamps. I had often wondered in an indolent way whether the harbers did that, or whether it was the boss. About this time I was amusing myself trying to guess where he would be most likely to cut me this time, but he got ahead of me, and sliced me on the end of the chin before I had got my mind made up. He immediately sharpened his razor— he might have done it before. I do not like a close shave, and would not let him go over me a second time. I tried to get him to put up his razor, dreading that he would make for the side of my chin, my pet tender spot, a place which a razor cannot touch twice without making trouble ; but he said he only wanted to just smooth off one little roughness, and in that same moment he slipped his razor along the forbidden ground, and the dreaded pimple- signs of a close shave rose up smarting and answered to the call. Now he soaked his towel in bay rum, and slipped it all over my face nastily; slapped jf?Over as if a human being ever yet washed his face in that way. Then he dried it by slapping with the dry part of the towel, as if a human being ever dried ABOUT BARBERS. 165 his face in such a fashion ; but a barber seldom rubs you like a Christian. .Next he poked bay rum into the cut place with his towel, then choked the wound with powdered starch, then soaked it with bay rum again, and would have gone on soaking and powdering it for ever- more, no doubt, if I had not rebelled and begged off. He powdered my whole face now, straightened me up, and began to plough my hair thoughtfully with his hands and examine his fingers critically. Then he suggested a shampoo, and said my hair needed it badly, very badly. I observed that I shampooed it myself very thoroughly in the bath yesterday. I had him again. He next recommended some of Smith's Hair Grlorifier, and offered to sell me a bottle. I declined. He praised the new perfume, "Jones's Delight of the Toilet, and proposed to sell me some of that. I declined again. He tendered me a tooth- wash atrocity of his own invention, and when I declined offered to trade knives with me. He returned to business after the miscarriage of this last enterprise, sprinkled me all over, legs and all, greased my hair in defiance of my pro- tests against it, rubbed and scrubbed a good deal of it by the roots, and combed and brushed the rest, parting it behind and plastering the eter- 166 MARK TWAIN. nal inverted arch of hair down on my forehead, and then, while combing my scant eyebrows and defiling them with pomade, strung out an account of the achievements of a six-ounce black and tan terrier of his till I heard the whistles blow for noon, and knew I was five minutes too late for the train. Then he snatched away the towel, brushed it lightly about my face, passed his comb through my eyebrows once more, and gayly sang out Next! This barber fell down and died of apoplexy two hours later. I am waiting over a day for my revenge—I am going to attend his funeral. 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He was a writer whose attabiments were exceedingly great, and whose wit and humour have been universally acknowledged and enjoyed. On toned paper, beautifully bound, gilt edges, price 15$. Poets' Wit and Humour. Selected by W. H. Wills. With 100 Curious Engravings from Drawings by Charles Bennett and George Thomas. New edition, richly bound, gilt edges, price 15J. Sabbath Bells Chimed by the Poets. With Coloured Engravings by Birket Foster. Appropriately bound, price 7s. 6d., cloth ; bevelled boards, gilt edges, 10s. 6d. The Pilgrim's Progress from this World to that which is to Come. By John Bunyan. With a Memoir of the Author by H. W. Dulcken, Ph.D., and 100 Page and other Illustrations by Thomas Dalziel, engraved by the Brothers Dalziel. New Edition, price 1 or. 6d., appropriately bound. Pearls from the Poets. A Collection of Specimens of the Works of Celebrated Writers, with Biographical Notices. The Poems selected by H. W. Dulcken, Ph.D., M.A., with a Preface by the late Rev. Thomas Dale, M.A., Canon of St. Paul's. Price 21s. A Beautiful Edition of the Holy Bible. With Illustrations selected from Raphael's Pictures in the Vatican, adapted by Robert Dudley. Superbly printed in Tints, with Gold Borders, in the highest style of Art. Magni- ficently bound in Relievo Leather, from a design by Owen Jones, with gilt red edges ; or in elegant cloth binding, 10s. Cd. Ditto, ditto, in elegant cloth binding, leather back, price ioa 6d. Price One Guinea. New Edition Just Ready. The Poetical Works of Edgar Allan Poe. With Illustrations after Tenniel, Birket Foster, Pickersgill, &c., and Head and Tail Pieces by Harry Rogers. Published by Ward\ Lock, and Tyler. 12 New Books and New Editions. Mbhz anil Cammeniarm THE NEW ILLUSTRATED FAMILY BIBLE. 4to, cloth gilt, illuminated side, plain edges, 21s.; ditto, red edges, 22s.; half-bound calf, red edges, 3U. 6d.; morocco, gilt edges, 42s.; Turkey morocco, extra, 52s. 6d. COBBIN'S ILLUSTRATED FAMILY BIBLE andPEOPLE'S Commentary. With Family Register, a Profusion cf Illustrations of Biblical Localities, and of Incidents from the Holy Scriptures, by Overbeck Rethel, and other great Scriptural Artists. With a large number of Coloured Pictures. A Family Bible and Commentary, cheap in price, trustworthy in explanations, and attractive in form, has long been desired. 44 Cobbin's Illustrated Family Bible and People's Commentary will be found to give a number of advan- tages to purchasers. Some of these advantages are described below. I. It is the only Family Bible published with beautifully Coloured Plates. II. The present Family Bible will be by far the Cheapest yet issued. It will cost scarcely one-third of the price which is now paid for the lowest-priced Family Bible, although these have been hitherto considered marvels of cheapness. III. The Commentary, by one of our most eminent Biblical Scholars, will be found complete, and will afford all needed information for an intelligent perusal of Holy Writ, now so closely searched, and made the subject of much hostile, as well as friendly criticism. Thus, in this issue of the Bible, subscribers will possess an admirable Commentary—clear, concise, and thoroughly trustworthy. Many Com- mentaries occupy the space of six volumes, costing a large sum of money: and hardly any really good Commentary can be bought which does not occupy as many as three volumes. But "Cobbin's Family Bible and People's Commentary will combine, for Clergymen, Teachers, and Students, in one compact, handsome, and portable volume, both the Text of Holy Writ and a full Commentary. The well-engraved and printed Maps and Illustrative Engravings, the beautiful many- coloured Pictures, the artistic and useful Register of Family Events, printed in Tints, and ruled for the insertion of the Family Names and Events, all unite to form a Bible for the People of Great Britain, as well-fitted for the Cottage by its Cheapness as for the Palace by its Completeness of Text and Commentary and beauty of appearance. Price "js. 6d. TEACHER'S PICTORIAL BIBLE and BIBLE DICTIONARY. The Authorized Version. Illustrated by Graphic Engravings and Maps, contain- ing the Old and New Testaments, translated out of the Original Tongues, and with the former Translations diligently Compared and Revised by His Majesty's Special Command. Appointed to be read in Churches. With the most approved Marginal References, and. Historical and Descriptive Illustrations appended to each Book and in the Dictionary. By the Rev. 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Illustrated by Notes on Oriental and Scriptural History, Scenery, and Customs. Numerous Page Engravings and Maps. Turkey morocco extra, blind, gilt edges . . . .12 Turkey morocco antique be- veiled red and gold edges . 17 Best dull gilt clasp for above 2 s. d. 1. Crown 8vo, cloth antique, red edges, lettered on side . n 6 2. French morocco, blind, gilt edges . . . . .10 6 3. Pigskin bevelled boards, blind, gilt edges . . . . 14 6 *** The Companion Bible meets the wants and means of a numerous class of readers, and, indeed, forms a complete Cyclopedia of Oriental intelligence. The reader will here find a7nple information respecting the Manners, Custo77is, a7id Geography of the Holy Land, and of those cotintries which were in so7ne way associated with it in the historical pages of Scripture, a7id a good hldex will facilitate every i)iqiury. Cobbin's Portable Commentary. 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Fcap. 8vo, 796 pp. d. s. d. 15. French morocco, blind, gilt edges 50 16. Pigskin bevelled boards,blind, gilt edges . . . .66 17. Turkey morocco extra, blind, gilt edges .... 18. Turkey morocco limp, blind, gilt edges . . . _ . 7 19. Calf or Turkey morocco, liir.p circuit, gilt edges . . 10 20. Turkey morocco, antique be- veiled, red and gold edges . 9 Best dull gilt clasp for above 1 Published by Ward, Lock, and Tyler. 14 New Boohs and New Editions. Mctimtaries ot ^angttage. Now Ready, New and Cheaper Edition. Demy 8vo, 634 pages, cloth, 3J. 6d.; or, royal 8vo, half bound, 5J. Webster's Universal Pronouncing and Defining Dictionary of the English Language. Condensed from Noah Webster's Large Work, with numerous Synonyms, carefully Discriminated by Chauncey A. Goodrich, D.D., Professor in Yale College. To which are added "Walker's Key to the Pronun- ciation of Classical and Scriptural Proper Names ; a Vocabulary of Modern Geographical Names; Phrases and Quotations from the Ancient and Modern Languages ; Abbreviations used in Writing, Printing, &c. *** This comprehensive Work is heatitifnlly printed on good Paper, in a clear and distinct Type, in double columns, and has had the benefit of Revision to the Present Time. SS5~ This is now undoubtedly the Cheapest and Best English Dictionary. This Dictionary is one which must commend itself to every intelligent reader, containing, as it does, all the recently-adopted words in common use up to the end of last year. Let us add, it is carefully and well printed, and very cheap : and having- said so much, we feel assured that further commendation is unnecessary. It is good, useful, and cheap.—Liverpool Mail. THE CHEAPEST ENGLISH DICTIONARY EVER PUBLISHED. Fcap. 4to, cloth, price 2s. 6d. Webster's Improved Pronouncing Dictionary of the English Language. Condensed and Adapted to English Orthography and Usage, with Additions from various Accredited Sources, by Charles Robson. To which are added Accentuated Lists of Scriptural, Classical, and Modern Geographical Proper Names. tSs This carefully revised edition of Webster''s great work was undertaken, at considerable outlay, by the late David Bogue, and embraces all the best points of f the English and American authorities. It must supersede Johnson, Walker, Smart, Worcester, and its other predecessors. It is admirably adapted for School Use. JOHNSON AND WALKER SUPERSEDED. Containing Ten Thousand More Words than Walker's Dictionary. Royal i6mo, cloth, price is. Webster's Pocket Pronouncing Dictionary of the English Lan- guage. Condensed from the Original Dictionary by Noah Webster, LL.D.; with Accentuated Vocabularies of Classical, Scriptural, and Modern Geographical Names. Revised Edition, by William G. 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By George Kearlet. With Illustrations by F. W. Keyl. 34. Nature's Gifts Made Serviceable by Art and Industry for Mankind's Daily Use. By George Dodd. Illustrated by W. Harvey. 35. The Seasons and their Beauties : or, Flowers, Birds, and Insects of the Months. By II. G. Adams. 36. Mamma's Stories for her Little Ones. Original Stories for Boys and Girls. 37. The Path on Earth to the Gate of Heaven. 38. Stories of Courage & Principle. By Mrs. Gillespie Smytii. 43. Story of a Peasant. By MM. Erckmann-Chatrian. 2 vols. in One. 50. I've Been Thinking ; or, The Secret of Success. By A. S. Roe. 52. Holiday House. By Catherine Sinclair. 53. The Heart Triumphant; or, How Could He Help It? By Author of I've Been Thinking. 54. The Young Marooners. A Book for Boys. By F. R. Goulding. 55. The English Governess : A Tale of Real Life. By Author of "The School Girl in France. 56. Preston Tower. By Author of Margaret Catchpole. 57. The £5 Note : An Autobiography. By Author of "Naomi. 58. The Wide, Wide World. By Miss Wetherell. 59. To Love and to be Loved. By Author of "I've Been Thinking. 60. Uncle Tom's Cabin. By Mrs. Stovve. 61. Self-Sacrifice ; or, The Chancellor's Chaplain. By Rev. ERSKINE Neale, M.A. i 62. The Lamplighter. By Miss Cumming. j 63. The Journey of Life. By Catherine Sinclair. 64. The School Girl in France. By Miss McCrindell. 66. The Young Islanders. By Jeffreys Tayler. 68. The Mothers of Scripture ; or, Maternal Influence on Sons. By Dr. Robert Philp. 69. Maternal Counsels to a Daughter. By Mrs. Pullan. 70. The Battle for Truth; or, Emma de Lissau. 71. Good Old Stories. Coloured Illustrations. 72. Old Nursery Tales and Famous Histories. Coloured Must. 73. Orange Blossoms. A Book for all who have worn, are wearing, or are likely to wear them. By T. S. Arthur. 74. The Merchant's Clerk ; or, Principle or No Principle. A Book for Young Men. By the Rev. C. B. Tayler, M.A. 75. The Christian Martyrs ; or, the Converts of Carthage. By Mrs. Webb, Author of "Julamerk, "Naomi, &c. With Eight full-page Illustrations. 76. Julamerk : A Tale of the Ploly Land. By Mrs. Webb, Author of The Christian Martyrs, Naomi, &c. 77. Mary Bunyan; or, The Dreamer's Blind Daughter. By S. R. Ford. With Illustrations. Published by Ward, Lock, and Tyler. New Boohs and New Editions. 25 Price 7f. 6d., demy 8vo, handsomely bound, cloth. The Life of Tammie Chattie, of Le Bosquet des Rossignols, Victim of the Siege of Paris. By Zuckahoe, The work of a diplomatist known on both sides of the Atlantic, and long resident in Paris, this volume is redolent of a pleasant and amiable disposition, revealing itself in the cheerful style of the writer's manner. Nothing can be more delightful than his style, which is altogether free from any kind of ordinary conventionality. Now Ready, price ir.; postage 20?., with Portraits and separate Engravings. Livingstone and Stanley: a Narrative of the Explorations of the English Discoverer, and of the Adventures of the American Journalist. With Illustrations, and a Map showing the Wanderings of Livingstone, the Course of Stanley, and the Place of Meeting. Briefly, the Contents comprise:—Modern Exploration of the Nile—The Portugese Ascendency on the East Coast of Africa—David Livingstone : his Parentage, and Sketch of his Life till 1871—Zanzibar as a Base of Missionary Enterprise—The New York Herald and James Gordon Bennett—The New York Herald Expedition —H. M. Stanley-—Young's Expedition in Search of Stanley —The Livingstone Search Expedition. WARD, LOCK, AND TYLER'S Smea of ^Itoo Shilling ffobels. 4. The Sunny South. By Armstrong. 5. Perils by Sea and Land. By Arm- strong. 11. The Jilt. By Author of Flirt. 12. Life of a Beauty. Author of Flirt. 16. Bride Elect. By Author of Fiirc. 21. Holiday House. By Sinclair. 33. Preston Tower. By Cobbold. 35. The Pilgrims of New England. By Mrs. Webb. 41. Plyers of the Hunt. By Mills. 42. Stable Secrets. By Mills. 45. Father Dareey. By Marsh. 47. Time the Avenger. By Marsh. 49. Stuart of Dunleath. By Norton. 51. Wild Oats. By Wraxall. 53. Peep o'Day. By Banim. 59. Amy Moss. By St. John. 67. Guilty or Not Guilty. By Smythies. 73. Pere Goriot. By Balzac. 74. Mildred's Wedding. 77. Eccentric Personages. By W. H. Russell. 78. Paid in Full. By H. J. Byron. 81. Hector Mainwaring. Fonblanque. 85. The French Detective. By Canler. 86. Hadji Baba in England. Morier. 87. Hester Taffetas. 88. Disguised Nobleman. ByFeuillet. 90. Man of the World. By Fullom. 91. Sketches in London. By Grant. 93. Ambition. By Smith. 103. Lamplighter. By Cumming. 107. Ida May. By Langdon. 109. Nellie Truro. 122. Mountain Marriage. By M. Reid. 127. Improvisatore. By Andersen. 130. Margaret Catchpole. By Cobbold. Published by Ward\ Lock, and Tyler. 26 New Boohs and New Editions. durational a ttb Jtctotra $oaks. Just Ready, New Editions, crown 8vo, cloth lettered, price 6s. History of English Poetry. From the Eleventh to the Seventeenth Century. By Thomas Warton, B.D., Poet-Laureate, Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, and of the Society of Antiquaries, and late Professor of Poetry in the University of Oxford. Crown 8vo, toned paper, cloth lettered, price 41. Europe During the Middle Ages. By Henry Hallam, LL.D., F.R.A.S., Author of "The Constitutional History of England, &c. Crown 8vo, toned paper, cloth, lettered. Church and State. Being a View of the State of Europe during the Middle Ages—History of Ecclesiastical Power—The Constitutional History of England—On the State of Society in Europe. By Henry Hallam, LL.D., F.R.A.S. Crown 8vo, cloth lettered. The Court and Times of Queen Elizabeth. By Lucy Aikin. Crown 8vo, cloth lettered. Early Britain under Trojan, Roman, and Saxon Rule, by John Milton. England under Richard III., by Sir Thomas More. 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Either to the young who are learning history, to the old, who desire to gain lessons from experience, or to the more feminine minds, who delight in a story of entrancing interest, full of charming details of the purest parental love and affection, and evidencing a fraternal devotion only ending with life itself, to all good hearts and refined intelligences, these exquisite Volumes of MM. Ercic- Mann-Chatrian will appeal in tones of wholesome and invigorating effect. Price as. 6d. each, with Illustrations, handsomely bound in cloth, gilt and plain edges. Price is. each, paper covers. 1. The Conscript. 2. The Blockade. 3. Waterloo. 4. Madame Therese ; or, The Volunteers of 1792. 5. Story of a Peasant. 1789. 6. Story of a Peasant. 1792. 7. Popular Tales & Romances. 8. Illustrious Dr. Matheus. 9. Alsacian Schoolmaster. 10. Friend Fritz. ^hc pig Series. Fcap. 8vo, Emblematical Coloured Enamelled Wrapper, is.; cloth- plain edges, ir. 6d.; gilt edges, 2s. 1. 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By the Author of "The Wide, Wide World. Published by Ward, Lock, and Tyler. 28 New Books and New Editions. WARD, LOCK, & TYLER'S dDtte Shilling ^02 ftaoks for Chilbrnr: These new and marvellously cheap and beautifully Coloured Toy Books possess the great superiority and advantage of having all the recent inventions and im- provements brought to bear upon their production. It will be a matter of wonder and astonishment that such a very superior series of Books can be offered to the public at so small a price as One Shilling each. 1. Domestic Animals. 2. Home and Field Animals. *3. Nursery Songs and Ballads. 5. Nursery Tales and Stories. 6. Popular Rhymes and Pretty Stories. *7. Adventures with Animals. 8. The Picture Rohinson Crusoe. *9. The Children's Household Pets. *10. The Children's Picture Alphabet, n. The Little Pussy Cats. *12. The Naughty Puppies. *13. A B C of Animals and Birds. *14. A B C of Pretty Country Scenes. *15. 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Their possession of the Copyright Works of Coleridge, Hood, Keats, Shelley, Wordsworth, and other great National Poets, places this Series above rivalry. 1. Byron's Poetical Works. ■>.. Longfellow's Poetical Works. 3. Wordsworth's Poetical Works. 4. Sott's Poetical Works. 5. Shvley's Poetical Works. 6. Moovs's Poetical Works. 7. Hoo I'a Poetical Works. S. Keats's Poetical Works. 9. Coleridge's Poetical Works. 10. Burns's Poetical Works. 11. Tupper's Proverbial Philosophy. The Four Series Complete for the First Time in One Volume, with Portrait. 12. Milton's Poetical Works. 13. Campbell's (Thos.) Poetical Works. 14. Pope's Poetical Works. 15. Cowper's Poetical Works. 16. A Selection of Humorous Poetry. 17. A Selection of American Poetry. 18. Mrs. Hemans' Poems. [Nearly ready. Now ready, in folio, cloth gilt, gilt edges, 21 s.; Proofs, India, mounted, 42s. KEATS'S POETIC ROMANCE, ENDYMION. Illustrated by E. J. Poynter, A.R.A. Six magnificent engravings on steel by F. 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