The _30_000 Bequest_ and Other Stories Mark Twain 1747 downloads.pdf

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The $30,000 Bequest, and
Other Stories
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you
will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: The $30,000 Bequest, and Other Stories

Author: Mark Twain

Release date: September 14, 2004 [eBook #142]
Most recently updated: October 29, 2024

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/142

Credits: Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer, and David Widger

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE $30,000
BEQUEST, AND OTHER STORIES ***

THE $30,000 BEQUEST

and Other Stories

by Mark Twain
(Samuel L. Clemens)

CONTENTS

THE $30,000 BEQUEST
CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III
CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER V
CHAPTER VI
CHAPTER VII
CHAPTER VIII

A DOG'S TALE
CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III

WAS IT HEAVEN? OR HELL?
CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III
CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER V
CHAPTER VI
CHAPTER VII
CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER IX
CHAPTER X

A CURE FOR THE BLUES
THE CURIOUS BOOK
THE CALIFORNIAN'S TALE
A HELPLESS SITUATION
A TELEPHONIC CONVERSATION
EDWARD MILLS AND GEORGE BENTON: A TALE
THE FIVE BOONS OF LIFE
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V

THE FIRST WRITING-MACHINES
ITALIAN WITHOUT A MASTER
ITALIAN WITH GRAMMAR
A BURLESQUE BIOGRAPHY
HOW TO TELL A STORY
GENERAL WASHINGTON'S NEGRO BODY-SERVANT
WIT INSPIRATIONS OF THE “TWO-YEAR-OLDS”
AN ENTERTAINING ARTICLE
A LETTER TO THE SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY
AMENDED OBITUARIES
A MONUMENT TO ADAM
A HUMANE WORD FROM SATAN
INTRODUCTION TO “THE NEW GUIDE OF THE
CONVERSATION IN PORTUGUESE AND ENGLISH”
ADVICE TO LITTLE GIRLS

POST-MORTEM POETRY (1)
THE DANGER OF LYING IN BED
PORTRAIT OF KING WILLIAM III
DOES THE RACE OF MAN LOVE A LORD?
EXTRACTS FROM ADAM'S DIARY
EVE'S DIARY
EXTRACT FROM ADAM'S DIARY

THE $30,000 BEQUEST

CHAPTER I
Lakeside was a pleasant little town of five or six thousand inhabitants,
and a rather pretty one, too, as towns go in the Far West. It had church
accommodations for thirty-five thousand, which is the way of the Far West
and the South, where everybody is religious, and where each of the
Protestant sects is represented and has a plant of its own. Rank was
unknown in Lakeside—unconfessed, anyway; everybody knew everybody
and his dog, and a sociable friendliness was the prevailing atmosphere.
Saladin Foster was book-keeper in the principal store, and the only high-
salaried man of his profession in Lakeside. He was thirty-five years old,
now; he had served that store for fourteen years; he had begun in his
marriage-week at four hundred dollars a year, and had climbed steadily up,
a hundred dollars a year, for four years; from that time forth his wage had
remained eight hundred—a handsome figure indeed, and everybody
conceded that he was worth it.
His wife, Electra, was a capable helpmeet, although—like himself—a
dreamer of dreams and a private dabbler in romance. The first thing she did,
after her marriage—child as she was, aged only nineteen—was to buy an
acre of ground on the edge of the town, and pay down the cash for it—
twenty-five dollars, all her fortune. Saladin had less, by fifteen. She
instituted a vegetable garden there, got it farmed on shares by the nearest
neighbor, and made it pay her a hundred per cent. a year. Out of Saladin's
first year's wage she put thirty dollars in the savings-bank, sixty out of his
second, a hundred out of his third, a hundred and fifty out of his fourth. His
wage went to eight hundred a year, then, and meantime two children had
arrived and increased the expenses, but she banked two hundred a year from
the salary, nevertheless, thenceforth. When she had been married seven
years she built and furnished a pretty and comfortable two-thousand-dollar
house in the midst of her garden-acre, paid half of the money down and
moved her family in. Seven years later she was out of debt and had several
hundred dollars out earning its living.
Earning it by the rise in landed estate; for she had long ago bought
another acre or two and sold the most of it at a profit to pleasant people who

were willing to build, and would be good neighbors and furnish a general
comradeship for herself and her growing family. She had an independent
income from safe investments of about a hundred dollars a year; her
children were growing in years and grace; and she was a pleased and happy
woman. Happy in her husband, happy in her children, and the husband and
the children were happy in her. It is at this point that this history begins.
The youngest girl, Clytemnestra—called Clytie for short—was eleven;
her sister, Gwendolen—called Gwen for short—was thirteen; nice girls, and
comely. The names betray the latent romance-tinge in the parental blood,
the parents' names indicate that the tinge was an inheritance. It was an
affectionate family, hence all four of its members had pet names, Saladin's
was a curious and unsexing one—Sally; and so was Electra's—Aleck. All
day long Sally was a good and diligent book-keeper and salesman; all day
long Aleck was a good and faithful mother and housewife, and thoughtful
and calculating business woman; but in the cozy living-room at night they
put the plodding world away, and lived in another and a fairer, reading
romances to each other, dreaming dreams, comrading with kings and
princes and stately lords and ladies in the flash and stir and splendor of
noble palaces and grim and ancient castles.

CHAPTER II
Now came great news! Stunning news—joyous news, in fact. It came
from a neighboring state, where the family's only surviving relative lived. It
was Sally's relative—a sort of vague and indefinite uncle or second or third
cousin by the name of Tilbury Foster, seventy and a bachelor, reputed well
off and corresponding sour and crusty. Sally had tried to make up to him
once, by letter, in a bygone time, and had not made that mistake again.
Tilbury now wrote to Sally, saying he should shortly die, and should leave
him thirty thousand dollars, cash; not for love, but because money had
given him most of his troubles and exasperations, and he wished to place it
where there was good hope that it would continue its malignant work. The
bequest would be found in his will, and would be paid over. PROVIDED,
that Sally should be able to prove to the executors that he had Taken no
notice of the gift by spoken word or by letter, had made no inquiries
concerning the moribund's progress toward the everlasting tropics, and had
not attended the funeral.
As soon as Aleck had partially recovered from the tremendous emotions
created by the letter, she sent to the relative's habitat and subscribed for the
local paper.
Man and wife entered into a solemn compact, now, to never mention the
great news to any one while the relative lived, lest some ignorant person
carry the fact to the death-bed and distort it and make it appear that they
were disobediently thankful for the bequest, and just the same as confessing
it and publishing it, right in the face of the prohibition.
For the rest of the day Sally made havoc and confusion with his books,
and Aleck could not keep her mind on her affairs, not even take up a flower-
pot or book or a stick of wood without forgetting what she had intended to
do with it. For both were dreaming.
“Thir-ty thousand dollars!”
All day long the music of those inspiring words sang through those
people's heads.

From his marriage-day forth, Aleck's grip had been upon the purse, and
Sally had seldom known what it was to be privileged to squander a dime on
non-necessities.
“Thir-ty thousand dollars!” the song went on and on. A vast sum, an
unthinkable sum!
All day long Aleck was absorbed in planning how to invest it, Sally in
planning how to spend it.
There was no romance-reading that night. The children took themselves
away early, for their parents were silent, distraught, and strangely
unentertaining. The good-night kisses might as well have been impressed
upon vacancy, for all the response they got; the parents were not aware of
the kisses, and the children had been gone an hour before their absence was
noticed. Two pencils had been busy during that hour—note-making; in the
way of plans. It was Sally who broke the stillness at last. He said, with
exultation:
“Ah, it'll be grand, Aleck! Out of the first thousand we'll have a horse and
a buggy for summer, and a cutter and a skin lap-robe for winter.”
Aleck responded with decision and composure—
“Out of the capital? Nothing of the kind. Not if it was a million!”
Sally was deeply disappointed; the glow went out of his face.
“Oh, Aleck!” he said, reproachfully. “We've always worked so hard and
been so scrimped: and now that we are rich, it does seem—”
He did not finish, for he saw her eye soften; his supplication had touched
her. She said, with gentle persuasiveness:
“We must not spend the capital, dear, it would not be wise. Out of the
income from it—”
“That will answer, that will answer, Aleck! How dear and good you are!
There will be a noble income and if we can spend that—”
“Not all of it, dear, not all of it, but you can spend a part of it. That is, a
reasonable part. But the whole of the capital—every penny of it—must be
put right to work, and kept at it. You see the reasonableness of that, don't
you?”
“Why, ye-s. Yes, of course. But we'll have to wait so long. Six months
before the first interest falls due.”

“Yes—maybe longer.”
“Longer, Aleck? Why? Don't they pay half-yearly?”
“That kind of an investment—yes; but I sha'n't invest in that way.”
“What way, then?”
“For big returns.”
“Big. That's good. Go on, Aleck. What is it?”
“Coal. The new mines. Cannel. I mean to put in ten thousand. Ground
floor. When we organize, we'll get three shares for one.”
“By George, but it sounds good, Aleck! Then the shares will be worth—
how much? And when?”
“About a year. They'll pay ten per cent. half yearly, and be worth thirty
thousand. I know all about it; the advertisement is in the Cincinnati paper
here.”
“Land, thirty thousand for ten—in a year! Let's jam in the whole capital
and pull out ninety! I'll write and subscribe right now—tomorrow it maybe
too late.”
He was flying to the writing-desk, but Aleck stopped him and put him
back in his chair. She said:
“Don't lose your head so. We mustn't subscribe till we've got the money;
don't you know that?”
Sally's excitement went down a degree or two, but he was not wholly
appeased.
“Why, Aleck, we'll have it, you know—and so soon, too. He's probably
out of his troubles before this; it's a hundred to nothing he's selecting his
brimstone-shovel this very minute. Now, I think—”
Aleck shuddered, and said:
“How can you, Sally! Don't talk in that way, it is perfectly scandalous.”
“Oh, well, make it a halo, if you like, I don't care for his outfit, I was only
just talking. Can't you let a person talk?”
“But why should you want to talk in that dreadful way? How would you
like to have people talk so about you, and you not cold yet?”
“Not likely to be, for one while, I reckon, if my last act was giving away
money for the sake of doing somebody a harm with it. But never mind

about Tilbury, Aleck, let's talk about something worldly. It does seem to me
that that mine is the place for the whole thirty. What's the objection?”
“All the eggs in one basket—that's the objection.”
“All right, if you say so. What about the other twenty? What do you
mean to do with that?”
“There is no hurry; I am going to look around before I do anything with
it.”
“All right, if your mind's made up,” sighed Sally. He was deep in thought
awhile, then he said:
“There'll be twenty thousand profit coming from the ten a year from now.
We can spend that, can't we, Aleck?”
Aleck shook her head.
“No, dear,” she said, “it won't sell high till we've had the first semi-
annual dividend. You can spend part of that.”
“Shucks, only that—and a whole year to wait! Confound it, I—”
“Oh, do be patient! It might even be declared in three months—it's quite
within the possibilities.”
“Oh, jolly! oh, thanks!” and Sally jumped up and kissed his wife in
gratitude. “It'll be three thousand—three whole thousand! how much of it
can we spend, Aleck? Make it liberal!—do, dear, that's a good fellow.”
Aleck was pleased; so pleased that she yielded to the pressure and
conceded a sum which her judgment told her was a foolish extravagance—a
thousand dollars. Sally kissed her half a dozen times and even in that way
could not express all his joy and thankfulness. This new access of gratitude
and affection carried Aleck quite beyond the bounds of prudence, and
before she could restrain herself she had made her darling another grant—a
couple of thousand out of the fifty or sixty which she meant to clear within
a year of the twenty which still remained of the bequest. The happy tears
sprang to Sally's eyes, and he said:
“Oh, I want to hug you!” And he did it. Then he got his notes and sat
down and began to check off, for first purchase, the luxuries which he
should earliest wish to secure. “Horse—buggy—cutter—lap-robe—patent-
leathers—dog—plug-hat— church-pew—stem-winder—new teeth—say,
Aleck!”

“Well?”
“Ciphering away, aren't you? That's right. Have you got the twenty
thousand invested yet?”
“No, there's no hurry about that; I must look around first, and think.”
“But you are ciphering; what's it about?”
“Why, I have to find work for the thirty thousand that comes out of the
coal, haven't I?”
“Scott, what a head! I never thought of that. How are you getting along?
Where have you arrived?”
“Not very far—two years or three. I've turned it over twice; once in oil
and once in wheat.”
“Why, Aleck, it's splendid! How does it aggregate?”
“I think—well, to be on the safe side, about a hundred and eighty
thousand clear, though it will probably be more.”
“My! isn't it wonderful? By gracious! luck has come our way at last, after
all the hard sledding. Aleck!”
“Well?”
“I'm going to cash in a whole three hundred on the missionaries—what
real right have we care for expenses!”
“You couldn't do a nobler thing, dear; and it's just like your generous
nature, you unselfish boy.”
The praise made Sally poignantly happy, but he was fair and just enough
to say it was rightfully due to Aleck rather than to himself, since but for her
he should never have had the money.
Then they went up to bed, and in their delirium of bliss they forgot and
left the candle burning in the parlor. They did not remember until they were
undressed; then Sally was for letting it burn; he said they could afford it, if
it was a thousand. But Aleck went down and put it out.
A good job, too; for on her way back she hit on a scheme that would turn
the hundred and eighty thousand into half a million before it had had time
to get cold.

CHAPTER III
The little newspaper which Aleck had subscribed for was a Thursday
sheet; it would make the trip of five hundred miles from Tilbury's village
and arrive on Saturday. Tilbury's letter had started on Friday, more than a
day too late for the benefactor to die and get into that week's issue, but in
plenty of time to make connection for the next output. Thus the Fosters had
to wait almost a complete week to find out whether anything of a
satisfactory nature had happened to him or not. It was a long, long week,
and the strain was a heavy one. The pair could hardly have borne it if their
minds had not had the relief of wholesome diversion. We have seen that
they had that. The woman was piling up fortunes right along, the man was
spending them—spending all his wife would give him a chance at, at any
rate.
At last the Saturday came, and the Weekly Sagamore arrived. Mrs.
Eversly Bennett was present. She was the Presbyterian parson's wife, and
was working the Fosters for a charity. Talk now died a sudden death—on
the Foster side. Mrs. Bennett presently discovered that her hosts were not
hearing a word she was saying; so she got up, wondering and indignant, and
went away. The moment she was out of the house, Aleck eagerly tore the
wrapper from the paper, and her eyes and Sally's swept the columns for the
death-notices. Disappointment! Tilbury was not anywhere mentioned. Aleck
was a Christian from the cradle, and duty and the force of habit required her
to go through the motions. She pulled herself together and said, with a pious
two-per-cent. trade joyousness:
“Let us be humbly thankful that he has been spared; and—”
“Damn his treacherous hide, I wish—”
“Sally! For shame!”
“I don't care!” retorted the angry man. “It's the way you feel, and if you
weren't so immorally pious you'd be honest and say so.”
Aleck said, with wounded dignity:
“I do not see how you can say such unkind and unjust things. There is no
such thing as immoral piety.”

Sally felt a pang, but tried to conceal it under a shuffling attempt to save
his case by changing the form of it—as if changing the form while retaining
the juice could deceive the expert he was trying to placate. He said:
“I didn't mean so bad as that, Aleck; I didn't really mean immoral piety, I
only meant—meant—well, conventional piety, you know; er—shop piety;
the—the—why, you know what I mean. Aleck—the—well, where you put
up that plated article and play it for solid, you know, without intending
anything improper, but just out of trade habit, ancient policy, petrified
custom, loyalty to—to—hang it, I can't find the right words, but you know
what I mean, Aleck, and that there isn't any harm in it. I'll try again. You
see, it's this way. If a person—”
“You have said quite enough,” said Aleck, coldly; “let the subject be
dropped.”
“I'm willing,” fervently responded Sally, wiping the sweat from his
forehead and looking the thankfulness he had no words for. Then, musingly,
he apologized to himself. “I certainly held threes—I know it—but I drew
and didn't fill. That's where I'm so often weak in the game. If I had stood pat
—but I didn't. I never do. I don't know enough.”
Confessedly defeated, he was properly tame now and subdued. Aleck
forgave him with her eyes.
The grand interest, the supreme interest, came instantly to the front again;
nothing could keep it in the background many minutes on a stretch. The
couple took up the puzzle of the absence of Tilbury's death-notice. They
discussed it every which way, more or less hopefully, but they had to finish
where they began, and concede that the only really sane explanation of the
absence of the notice must be—and without doubt was—that Tilbury was
not dead. There was something sad about it, something even a little unfair,
maybe, but there it was, and had to be put up with. They were agreed as to
that. To Sally it seemed a strangely inscrutable dispensation; more
inscrutable than usual, he thought; one of the most unnecessary inscrutable
he could call to mind, in fact—and said so, with some feeling; but if he was
hoping to draw Aleck he failed; she reserved her opinion, if she had one;
she had not the habit of taking injudicious risks in any market, worldly or
other.
The pair must wait for next week's paper—Tilbury had evidently
postponed. That was their thought and their decision. So they put the

subject away and went about their affairs again with as good heart as they
could.
Now, if they had but known it, they had been wronging Tilbury all the
time. Tilbury had kept faith, kept it to the letter; he was dead, he had died to
schedule. He was dead more than four days now and used to it; entirely
dead, perfectly dead, as dead as any other new person in the cemetery; dead
in abundant time to get into that week's Sagamore, too, and only shut out by
an accident; an accident which could not happen to a metropolitan journal,
but which happens easily to a poor little village rag like the Sagamore. On
this occasion, just as the editorial page was being locked up, a gratis quart
of strawberry ice-water arrived from Hostetter's Ladies and Gents Ice-
Cream Parlors, and the stickful of rather chilly regret over Tilbury's
translation got crowded out to make room for the editor's frantic gratitude.
On its way to the standing-galley Tilbury's notice got pied. Otherwise it
would have gone into some future edition, for weekly Sagamores do not
waste “live” matter, and in their galleys “live” matter is immortal, unless a
pi accident intervenes. But a thing that gets pied is dead, and for such there
is no resurrection; its chance of seeing print is gone, forever and ever. And
so, let Tilbury like it or not, let him rave in his grave to his fill, no matter—
no mention of his death would ever see the light in the Weekly Sagamore.

CHAPTER IV
Five weeks drifted tediously along. The Sagamore arrived regularly on
the Saturdays, but never once contained a mention of Tilbury Foster. Sally's
patience broke down at this point, and he said, resentfully:
“Damn his livers, he's immortal!”
Aleck give him a very severe rebuke, and added with icy solemnity:
“How would you feel if you were suddenly cut off just after such an
awful remark had escaped out of you?”
Without sufficient reflection Sally responded:
“I'd feel I was lucky I hadn't got caught with it in me.”
Pride had forced him to say something, and as he could not think of any
rational thing to say he flung that out. Then he stole a base—as he called it
—that is, slipped from the presence, to keep from being brayed in his wife's
discussion-mortar.
Six months came and went. The Sagamore was still silent about Tilbury.
Meantime, Sally had several times thrown out a feeler—that is, a hint that
he would like to know. Aleck had ignored the hints. Sally now resolved to
brace up and risk a frontal attack. So he squarely proposed to disguise
himself and go to Tilbury's village and surreptitiously find out as to the
prospects. Aleck put her foot on the dangerous project with energy and
decision. She said:
“What can you be thinking of? You do keep my hands full! You have to
be watched all the time, like a little child, to keep you from walking into the
fire. You'll stay right where you are!”
“Why, Aleck, I could do it and not be found out—I'm certain of it.”
“Sally Foster, don't you know you would have to inquire around?”
“Of course, but what of it? Nobody would suspect who I was.”
“Oh, listen to the man! Some day you've got to prove to the executors
that you never inquired. What then?”

He had forgotten that detail. He didn't reply; there wasn't anything to say.
Aleck added:
“Now then, drop that notion out of your mind, and don't ever meddle
with it again. Tilbury set that trap for you. Don't you know it's a trap? He is
on the watch, and fully expecting you to blunder into it. Well, he is going to
be disappointed—at least while I am on deck. Sally!”
“Well?”
“As long as you live, if it's a hundred years, don't you ever make an
inquiry. Promise!”
“All right,” with a sigh and reluctantly.
Then Aleck softened and said:
“Don't be impatient. We are prospering; we can wait; there is no hurry.
Our small dead-certain income increases all the time; and as to futures, I
have not made a mistake yet—they are piling up by the thousands and tens
of thousands. There is not another family in the state with such prospects as
ours. Already we are beginning to roll in eventual wealth. You know that,
don't you?”
“Yes, Aleck, it's certainly so.”
“Then be grateful for what God is doing for us and stop worrying. You do
not believe we could have achieved these prodigious results without His
special help and guidance, do you?”
Hesitatingly, “N-no, I suppose not.” Then, with feeling and admiration,
“And yet, when it comes to judiciousness in watering a stock or putting up a
hand to skin Wall Street I don't give in that you need any outside amateur
help, if I do wish I—”
“Oh, do shut up! I know you do not mean any harm or any irreverence,
poor boy, but you can't seem to open your mouth without letting out things
to make a person shudder. You keep me in constant dread. For you and for
all of us. Once I had no fear of the thunder, but now when I hear it I—”
Her voice broke, and she began to cry, and could not finish. The sight of
this smote Sally to the heart and he took her in his arms and petted her and
comforted her and promised better conduct, and upbraided himself and
remorsefully pleaded for forgiveness. And he was in earnest, and sorry for
what he had done and ready for any sacrifice that could make up for it.

And so, in privacy, he thought long and deeply over the matter, resolving
to do what should seem best. It was easy to promise reform; indeed he had
already promised it. But would that do any real good, any permanent good?
No, it would be but temporary—he knew his weakness, and confessed it to
himself with sorrow—he could not keep the promise. Something surer and
better must be devised; and he devised it. At cost of precious money which
he had long been saving up, shilling by shilling, he put a lightning-rod on
the house.
At a subsequent time he relapsed.
What miracles habit can do! and how quickly and how easily habits are
acquired—both trifling habits and habits which profoundly change us. If by
accident we wake at two in the morning a couple of nights in succession,
we have need to be uneasy, for another repetition can turn the accident into
a habit; and a month's dallying with whiskey—but we all know these
commonplace facts.
The castle-building habit, the day-dreaming habit—how it grows! what a
luxury it becomes; how we fly to its enchantments at every idle moment,
how we revel in them, steep our souls in them, intoxicate ourselves with
their beguiling fantasies—oh yes, and how soon and how easily our dream
life and our material life become so intermingled and so fused together that
we can't quite tell which is which, any more.
By and by Aleck subscribed to a Chicago daily and for the Wall Street
Pointer. With an eye single to finance she studied these as diligently all the
week as she studied her Bible Sundays. Sally was lost in admiration, to note
with what swift and sure strides her genius and judgment developed and
expanded in the forecasting and handling of the securities of both the
material and spiritual markets. He was proud of her nerve and daring in
exploiting worldly stocks, and just as proud of her conservative caution in
working her spiritual deals. He noted that she never lost her head in either
case; that with a splendid courage she often went short on worldly futures,
but heedfully drew the line there—she was always long on the others. Her
policy was quite sane and simple, as she explained it to him: what she put
into earthly futures was for speculation, what she put into spiritual futures
was for investment; she was willing to go into the one on a margin, and take
chances, but in the case of the other, “margin her no margins”—she wanted

to cash in a hundred cents per dollar's worth, and have the stock transferred
on the books.
It took but a very few months to educate Aleck's imagination and Sally's.
Each day's training added something to the spread and effectiveness of the
two machines. As a consequence, Aleck made imaginary money much
faster than at first she had dreamed of making it, and Sally's competency in
spending the overflow of it kept pace with the strain put upon it, right
along. In the beginning, Aleck had given the coal speculation a
twelvemonth in which to materialize, and had been loath to grant that this
term might possibly be shortened by nine months. But that was the feeble
work, the nursery work, of a financial fancy that had had no teaching, no
experience, no practice. These aids soon came, then that nine months
vanished, and the imaginary ten-thousand-dollar investment came marching
home with three hundred per cent. profit on its back!
It was a great day for the pair of Fosters. They were speechless for joy.
Also speechless for another reason: after much watching of the market,
Aleck had lately, with fear and trembling, made her first flyer on a
“margin,” using the remaining twenty thousand of the bequest in this risk.
In her mind's eye she had seen it climb, point by point—always with a
chance that the market would break—until at last her anxieties were too
great for further endurance—she being new to the margin business and
unhardened, as yet—and she gave her imaginary broker an imaginary order
by imaginary telegraph to sell. She said forty thousand dollars' profit was
enough. The sale was made on the very day that the coal venture had
returned with its rich freight. As I have said, the couple were speechless,
they sat dazed and blissful that night, trying to realize that they were
actually worth a hundred thousand dollars in clean, imaginary cash. Yet so it
was.
It was the last time that ever Aleck was afraid of a margin; at least afraid
enough to let it break her sleep and pale her cheek to the extent that this
first experience in that line had done.
Indeed it was a memorable night. Gradually the realization that they were
rich sank securely home into the souls of the pair, then they began to place
the money. If we could have looked out through the eyes of these dreamers,
we should have seen their tidy little wooden house disappear, and two-story
brick with a cast-iron fence in front of it take its place; we should have seen

a three-globed gas-chandelier grow down from the parlor ceiling; we should
have seen the homely rag carpet turn to noble Brussels, a dollar and a half a
yard; we should have seen the plebeian fireplace vanish away and a
recherche, big base-burner with isinglass windows take position and spread
awe around. And we should have seen other things, too; among them the
buggy, the lap-robe, the stove-pipe hat, and so on.
From that time forth, although the daughters and the neighbors saw only
the same old wooden house there, it was a two-story brick to Aleck and
Sally and not a night went by that Aleck did not worry about the imaginary
gas-bills, and get for all comfort Sally's reckless retort: “What of it? We can
afford it.”
Before the couple went to bed, that first night that they were rich, they
had decided that they must celebrate. They must give a party—that was the
idea. But how to explain it—to the daughters and the neighbors? They
could not expose the fact that they were rich. Sally was willing, even
anxious, to do it; but Aleck kept her head and would not allow it. She said
that although the money was as good as in, it would be as well to wait until
it was actually in. On that policy she took her stand, and would not budge.
The great secret must be kept, she said—kept from the daughters and
everybody else.
The pair were puzzled. They must celebrate, they were determined to
celebrate, but since the secret must be kept, what could they celebrate? No
birthdays were due for three months. Tilbury wasn't available, evidently he
was going to live forever; what the nation could they celebrate? That was
Sally's way of putting it; and he was getting impatient, too, and harassed.
But at last he hit it—just by sheer inspiration, as it seemed to him—and all
their troubles were gone in a moment; they would celebrate the Discovery
of America. A splendid idea!
Aleck was almost too proud of Sally for words—she said she never
would have thought of it. But Sally, although he was bursting with delight
in the compliment and with wonder at himself, tried not to let on, and said it
wasn't really anything, anybody could have done it. Whereat Aleck, with a
prideful toss of her happy head, said:
“Oh, certainly! Anybody could—oh, anybody! Hosannah Dilkins, for
instance! Or maybe Adelbert Peanut—oh, dear—yes! Well, I'd like to see
them try it, that's all. Dear-me-suz, if they could think of the discovery of a

forty-acre island it's more than I believe they could; and as for the whole
continent, why, Sally Foster, you know perfectly well it would strain the
livers and lights out of them and then they couldn't!”
The dear woman, she knew he had talent; and if affection made her over-
estimate the size of it a little, surely it was a sweet and gentle crime, and
forgivable for its source's sake.

CHAPTER V
The celebration went off well. The friends were all present, both the
young and the old. Among the young were Flossie and Gracie Peanut and
their brother Adelbert, who was a rising young journeyman tinner, also
Hosannah Dilkins, Jr., journeyman plasterer, just out of his apprenticeship.
For many months Adelbert and Hosannah had been showing interest in
Gwendolen and Clytemnestra Foster, and the parents of the girls had
noticed this with private satisfaction. But they suddenly realized now that
that feeling had passed. They recognized that the changed financial
conditions had raised up a social bar between their daughters and the young
mechanics. The daughters could now look higher—and must. Yes, must.
They need marry nothing below the grade of lawyer or merchant; poppa
and momma would take care of this; there must be no mesalliances.
However, these thinkings and projects of theirs were private, and did not
show on the surface, and therefore threw no shadow upon the celebration.
What showed upon the surface was a serene and lofty contentment and a
dignity of carriage and gravity of deportment which compelled the
admiration and likewise the wonder of the company. All noticed it and all
commented upon it, but none was able to divine the secret of it. It was a
marvel and a mystery. Three several persons remarked, without suspecting
what clever shots they were making:
“It's as if they'd come into property.”
That was just it, indeed.
Most mothers would have taken hold of the matrimonial matter in the old
regulation way; they would have given the girls a talking to, of a solemn
sort and untactful—a lecture calculated to defeat its own purpose, by
producing tears and secret rebellion; and the said mothers would have
further damaged the business by requesting the young mechanics to
discontinue their attentions. But this mother was different. She was
practical. She said nothing to any of the young people concerned, nor to any
one else except Sally. He listened to her and understood; understood and
admired. He said:

“I get the idea. Instead of finding fault with the samples on view, thus
hurting feelings and obstructing trade without occasion, you merely offer a
higher class of goods for the money, and leave nature to take her course. It's
wisdom, Aleck, solid wisdom, and sound as a nut. Who's your fish? Have
you nominated him yet?”
No, she hadn't. They must look the market over—which they did. To start
with, they considered and discussed Brandish, rising young lawyer, and
Fulton, rising young dentist. Sally must invite them to dinner. But not right
away; there was no hurry, Aleck said. Keep an eye on the pair, and wait;
nothing would be lost by going slowly in so important a matter.
It turned out that this was wisdom, too; for inside of three weeks Aleck
made a wonderful strike which swelled her imaginary hundred thousand to
four hundred thousand of the same quality. She and Sally were in the clouds
that evening. For the first time they introduced champagne at dinner. Not
real champagne, but plenty real enough for the amount of imagination
expended on it. It was Sally that did it, and Aleck weakly submitted. At
bottom both were troubled and ashamed, for he was a high-up Son of
Temperance, and at funerals wore an apron which no dog could look upon
and retain his reason and his opinion; and she was a W. C. T. U., with all
that that implies of boiler-iron virtue and unendurable holiness. But there it
was; the pride of riches was beginning its disintegrating work. They had
lived to prove, once more, a sad truth which had been proven many times
before in the world: that whereas principle is a great and noble protection
against showy and degrading vanities and vices, poverty is worth six of it.
More than four hundred thousand dollars to the good. They took up the
matrimonial matter again. Neither the dentist nor the lawyer was
mentioned; there was no occasion, they were out of the running.
Disqualified. They discussed the son of the pork-packer and the son of the
village banker. But finally, as in the previous case, they concluded to wait
and think, and go cautiously and sure.
Luck came their way again. Aleck, ever watchful saw a great and risky
chance, and took a daring flyer. A time of trembling, of doubt, of awful
uneasiness followed, for non-success meant absolute ruin and nothing short
of it. Then came the result, and Aleck, faint with joy, could hardly control
her voice when she said:
“The suspense is over, Sally—and we are worth a cold million!”

Sally wept for gratitude, and said:
“Oh, Electra, jewel of women, darling of my heart, we are free at last, we
roll in wealth, we need never scrimp again. It's a case for Veuve Cliquot!”
and he got out a pint of spruce-beer and made sacrifice, he saying “Damn
the expense,” and she rebuking him gently with reproachful but humid and
happy eyes.
They shelved the pork-packer's son and the banker's son, and sat down to
consider the Governor's son and the son of the Congressman.

CHAPTER VI
It were a weariness to follow in detail the leaps and bounds the Foster
fictitious finances took from this time forth. It was marvelous, it was
dizzying, it was dazzling. Everything Aleck touched turned to fairy gold,
and heaped itself glittering toward the firmament. Millions upon millions
poured in, and still the mighty stream flowed thundering along, still its vast
volume increased. Five millions—ten millions—twenty—thirty—was there
never to be an end?
Two years swept by in a splendid delirium, the intoxicated Fosters
scarcely noticing the flight of time. They were now worth three hundred
million dollars; they were in every board of directors of every prodigious
combine in the country; and still as time drifted along, the millions went on
piling up, five at a time, ten at a time, as fast as they could tally them off,
almost. The three hundred double itself—then doubled again—and yet
again—and yet once more.
Twenty-four hundred millions!
The business was getting a little confused. It was necessary to take an
account of stock, and straighten it out. The Fosters knew it, they felt it, they
realized that it was imperative; but they also knew that to do it properly and
perfectly the task must be carried to a finish without a break when once it
was begun. A ten-hours' job; and where could they find ten leisure hours in
a bunch? Sally was selling pins and sugar and calico all day and every day;
Aleck was cooking and washing dishes and sweeping and making beds all
day and every day, with none to help, for the daughters were being saved up
for high society. The Fosters knew there was one way to get the ten hours,
and only one. Both were ashamed to name it; each waited for the other to
do it. Finally Sally said:
“Somebody's got to give in. It's up to me. Consider that I've named it—
never mind pronouncing it out aloud.”
Aleck colored, but was grateful. Without further remark, they fell. Fell,
and—broke the Sabbath. For that was their only free ten-hour stretch. It was
but another step in the downward path. Others would follow. Vast wealth

has temptations which fatally and surely undermine the moral structure of
persons not habituated to its possession.
They pulled down the shades and broke the Sabbath. With hard and
patient labor they overhauled their holdings and listed them. And a long-
drawn procession of formidable names it was! Starting with the Railway
Systems, Steamer Lines, Standard Oil, Ocean Cables, Diluted Telegraph,
and all the rest, and winding up with Klondike, De Beers, Tammany Graft,
and Shady Privileges in the Post-office Department.
Twenty-four hundred millions, and all safely planted in Good Things,
gilt-edged and interest-bearing. Income, $120,000,000 a year. Aleck fetched
a long purr of soft delight, and said:
“Is it enough?”
“It is, Aleck.”
“What shall we do?”
“Stand pat.”
“Retire from business?”
“That's it.”
“I am agreed. The good work is finished; we will take a long rest and
enjoy the money.”
“Good! Aleck!”
“Yes, dear?”
“How much of the income can we spend?”
“The whole of it.”
It seemed to her husband that a ton of chains fell from his limbs. He did
not say a word; he was happy beyond the power of speech.
After that, they broke the Sabbaths right along as fast as they turned up.
It is the first wrong step that counts. Every Sunday they put in the whole
day, after morning service, on inventions—inventions of ways to spend the
money. They got to continuing this delicious dissipation until past midnight;
and at every seance Aleck lavished millions upon great charities and
religious enterprises, and Sally lavished like sums upon matters to which (at
first) he gave definite names. Only at first. Later the names gradually lost
sharpness of outline, and eventually faded into “sundries,” thus becoming
entirely—but safely—undescriptive. For Sally was crumbling. The placing

of these millions added seriously and most uncomfortably to the family
expenses—in tallow candles. For a while Aleck was worried. Then, after a
little, she ceased to worry, for the occasion of it was gone. She was pained,
she was grieved, she was ashamed; but she said nothing, and so became an
accessory. Sally was taking candles; he was robbing the store. It is ever
thus. Vast wealth, to the person unaccustomed to it, is a bane; it eats into the
flesh and bone of his morals. When the Fosters were poor, they could have
been trusted with untold candles. But now they—but let us not dwell upon
it. From candles to apples is but a step: Sally got to taking apples; then
soap; then maple-sugar; then canned goods; then crockery. How easy it is to
go from bad to worse, when once we have started upon a downward course!
Meantime, other effects had been milestoning the course of the Fosters'
splendid financial march. The fictitious brick dwelling had given place to an
imaginary granite one with a checker-board mansard roof; in time this one
disappeared and gave place to a still grander home—and so on and so on.
Mansion after mansion, made of air, rose, higher, broader, finer, and each in
its turn vanished away; until now in these latter great days, our dreamers
were in fancy housed, in a distant region, in a sumptuous vast palace which
looked out from a leafy summit upon a noble prospect of vale and river and
receding hills steeped in tinted mists—and all private, all the property of the
dreamers; a palace swarming with liveried servants, and populous with
guests of fame and power, hailing from all the world's capitals, foreign and
domestic.
This palace was far, far away toward the rising sun, immeasurably
remote, astronomically remote, in Newport, Rhode Island, Holy Land of
High Society, ineffable Domain of the American Aristocracy. As a rule they
spent a part of every Sabbath—after morning service—in this sumptuous
home, the rest of it they spent in Europe, or in dawdling around in their
private yacht. Six days of sordid and plodding fact life at home on the
ragged edge of Lakeside and straitened means, the seventh in Fairyland—
such had been their program and their habit.
In their sternly restricted fact life they remained as of old—plodding,
diligent, careful, practical, economical. They stuck loyally to the little
Presbyterian Church, and labored faithfully in its interests and stood by its
high and tough doctrines with all their mental and spiritual energies. But in
their dream life they obeyed the invitations of their fancies, whatever they

might be, and howsoever the fancies might change. Aleck's fancies were not
very capricious, and not frequent, but Sally's scattered a good deal. Aleck,
in her dream life, went over to the Episcopal camp, on account of its large
official titles; next she became High-church on account of the candles and
shows; and next she naturally changed to Rome, where there were cardinals
and more candles. But these excursions were a nothing to Sally's. His dream
life was a glowing and continuous and persistent excitement, and he kept
every part of it fresh and sparkling by frequent changes, the religious part
along with the rest. He worked his religions hard, and changed them with
his shirt.
The liberal spendings of the Fosters upon their fancies began early in
their prosperities, and grew in prodigality step by step with their advancing
fortunes. In time they became truly enormous. Aleck built a university or
two per Sunday; also a hospital or two; also a Rowton hotel or so; also a
batch of churches; now and then a cathedral; and once, with untimely and
ill-chosen playfulness, Sally said, “It was a cold day when she didn't ship a
cargo of missionaries to persuade unreflecting Chinamen to trade off
twenty-four carat Confucianism for counterfeit Christianity.”
This rude and unfeeling language hurt Aleck to the heart, and she went
from the presence crying. That spectacle went to his own heart, and in his
pain and shame he would have given worlds to have those unkind words
back. She had uttered no syllable of reproach—and that cut him. Not one
suggestion that he look at his own record—and she could have made, oh, so
many, and such blistering ones! Her generous silence brought a swift
revenge, for it turned his thoughts upon himself, it summoned before him a
spectral procession, a moving vision of his life as he had been leading it
these past few years of limitless prosperity, and as he sat there reviewing it
his cheeks burned and his soul was steeped in humiliation. Look at her life
—how fair it was, and tending ever upward; and look at his own—how
frivolous, how charged with mean vanities, how selfish, how empty, how
ignoble! And its trend—never upward, but downward, ever downward!
He instituted comparisons between her record and his own. He had found
fault with her—so he mused—he! And what could he say for himself?
When she built her first church what was he doing? Gathering other blase
multimillionaires into a Poker Club; defiling his own palace with it; losing
hundreds of thousands to it at every sitting, and sillily vain of the admiring

notoriety it made for him. When she was building her first university, what
was he doing? Polluting himself with a gay and dissipated secret life in the
company of other fast bloods, multimillionaires in money and paupers in
character. When she was building her first foundling asylum, what was he
doing? Alas! When she was projecting her noble Society for the Purifying
of the Sex, what was he doing? Ah, what, indeed! When she and the W. C.
T. U. and the Woman with the Hatchet, moving with resistless march, were
sweeping the fatal bottle from the land, what was he doing? Getting drunk
three times a day. When she, builder of a hundred cathedrals, was being
gratefully welcomed and blest in papal Rome and decorated with the
Golden Rose which she had so honorably earned, what was he doing?
Breaking the bank at Monte Carlo.
He stopped. He could go no farther; he could not bear the rest. He rose
up, with a great resolution upon his lips: this secret life should be revealed,
and confessed; no longer would he live it clandestinely, he would go and
tell her All.
And that is what he did. He told her All; and wept upon her bosom; wept,
and moaned, and begged for her forgiveness. It was a profound shock, and
she staggered under the blow, but he was her own, the core of her heart, the
blessing of her eyes, her all in all, she could deny him nothing, and she
forgave him. She felt that he could never again be quite to her what he had
been before; she knew that he could only repent, and not reform; yet all
morally defaced and decayed as he was, was he not her own, her very own,
the idol of her deathless worship? She said she was his serf, his slave, and
she opened her yearning heart and took him in.

CHAPTER VII
One Sunday afternoon some time after this they were sailing the summer
seas in their dream yacht, and reclining in lazy luxury under the awning of
the after-deck. There was silence, for each was busy with his own thoughts.
These seasons of silence had insensibly been growing more and more
frequent of late; the old nearness and cordiality were waning. Sally's terrible
revelation had done its work; Aleck had tried hard to drive the memory of it
out of her mind, but it would not go, and the shame and bitterness of it were
poisoning her gracious dream life. She could see now (on Sundays) that her
husband was becoming a bloated and repulsive Thing. She could not close
her eyes to this, and in these days she no longer looked at him, Sundays,
when she could help it.
But she—was she herself without blemish? Alas, she knew she was not.
She was keeping a secret from him, she was acting dishonorably toward
him, and many a pang it was costing her. She was breaking the compact,
and concealing it from him. Under strong temptation she had gone into
business again; she had risked their whole fortune in a purchase of all the
railway systems and coal and steel companies in the country on a margin,
and she was now trembling, every Sabbath hour, lest through some chance
word of hers he find it out. In her misery and remorse for this treachery she
could not keep her heart from going out to him in pity; she was filled with
compunctions to see him lying there, drunk and contented, and never
suspecting. Never suspecting—trusting her with a perfect and pathetic trust,
and she holding over him by a thread a possible calamity of so devastating a
—
“Say—Aleck?”
The interrupting words brought her suddenly to herself. She was grateful
to have that persecuting subject from her thoughts, and she answered, with
much of the old-time tenderness in her tone:
“Yes, dear.”
“Do you know, Aleck, I think we are making a mistake—that is, you are.
I mean about the marriage business.” He sat up, fat and froggy and

benevolent, like a bronze Buddha, and grew earnest. “Consider—it's more
than five years. You've continued the same policy from the start: with every
rise, always holding on for five points higher. Always when I think we are
going to have some weddings, you see a bigger thing ahead, and I undergo
another disappointment. I think you are too hard to please. Some day we'll
get left. First, we turned down the dentist and the lawyer. That was all right
—it was sound. Next, we turned down the banker's son and the pork-
butcher's heir—right again, and sound. Next, we turned down the
Congressman's son and the Governor's—right as a trivet, I confess it. Next
the Senator's son and the son of the Vice-President of the United States—
perfectly right, there's no permanency about those little distinctions. Then
you went for the aristocracy; and I thought we had struck oil at last—yes.
We would make a plunge at the Four Hundred, and pull in some ancient
lineage, venerable, holy, ineffable, mellow with the antiquity of a hundred
and fifty years, disinfected of the ancestral odors of salt-cod and pelts all of
a century ago, and unsmirched by a day's work since, and then! why, then
the marriages, of course. But no, along comes a pair of real aristocrats from
Europe, and straightway you throw over the half-breeds. It was awfully
discouraging, Aleck! Since then, what a procession! You turned down the
baronets for a pair of barons; you turned down the barons for a pair of
viscounts; the viscounts for a pair of earls; the earls for a pair of marquises;
the marquises for a brace of dukes. Now, Aleck, cash in!—you've played the
limit. You've got a job lot of four dukes under the hammer; of four
nationalities; all sound in the wind and limb and pedigree, all bankrupt and
in debt up to the ears. They come high, but we can afford it. Come, Aleck,
don't delay any longer, don't keep up the suspense: take the whole lay-out,
and leave the girls to choose!”
Aleck had been smiling blandly and contentedly all through this
arraignment of her marriage policy, a pleasant light, as of triumph with
perhaps a nice surprise peeping out through it, rose in her eyes, and she
said, as calmly as she could:
“Sally, what would you say to—royalty?”
Prodigious! Poor man, it knocked him silly, and he fell over the
garboard-strake and barked his shin on the cat-heads. He was dizzy for a
moment, then he gathered himself up and limped over and sat down by his

wife and beamed his old-time admiration and affection upon her in floods,
out of his bleary eyes.
“By George!” he said, fervently, “Aleck, you are great—the greatest
woman in the whole earth! I can't ever learn the whole size of you. I can't
ever learn the immeasurable deeps of you. Here I've been considering
myself qualified to criticize your game. I! Why, if I had stopped to think, I'd
have known you had a lone hand up your sleeve. Now, dear heart, I'm all
red-hot impatience—tell me about it!”
The flattered and happy woman put her lips to his ear and whispered a
princely name. It made him catch his breath, it lit his face with exultation.
“Land!” he said, “it's a stunning catch! He's got a gambling-hall, and a
graveyard, and a bishop, and a cathedral—all his very own. And all gilt-
edged five-hundred-per-cent. stock, every detail of it; the tidiest little
property in Europe; and that graveyard—it's the selectest in the world: none
but suicides admitted; yes, sir, and the free-list suspended, too, all the time.
There isn't much land in the principality, but there's enough: eight hundred
acres in the graveyard and forty-two outside. It's a sovereignty—that's the
main thing; land's nothing. There's plenty land, Sahara's drugged with it.”
Aleck glowed; she was profoundly happy. She said:
“Think of it, Sally—it is a family that has never married outside the
Royal and Imperial Houses of Europe: our grandchildren will sit upon
thrones!”
“True as you live, Aleck—and bear scepters, too; and handle them as
naturally and nonchantly as I handle a yardstick. It's a grand catch, Aleck.
He's corralled, is he? Can't get away? You didn't take him on a margin?”
“No. Trust me for that. He's not a liability, he's an asset. So is the other
one.”
“Who is it, Aleck?”
“His Royal Highness Sigismund-Siegfried-Lauenfeld-Dinkelspiel-
Schwartzenberg Blutwurst, Hereditary Grand Duke of Katzenyammer.”
“No! You can't mean it!”
“It's as true as I'm sitting here, I give you my word,” she answered.
His cup was full, and he hugged her to his heart with rapture, saying:

“How wonderful it all seems, and how beautiful! It's one of the oldest
and noblest of the three hundred and sixty-four ancient German
principalities, and one of the few that was allowed to retain its royal estate
when Bismarck got done trimming them. I know that farm, I've been there.
It's got a rope-walk and a candle-factory and an army. Standing army.
Infantry and cavalry. Three soldier and a horse. Aleck, it's been a long wait,
and full of heartbreak and hope deferred, but God knows I am happy now.
Happy, and grateful to you, my own, who have done it all. When is it to
be?”
“Next Sunday.”
“Good. And we'll want to do these weddings up in the very regalest style
that's going. It's properly due to the royal quality of the parties of the first
part. Now as I understand it, there is only one kind of marriage that is
sacred to royalty, exclusive to royalty: it's the morganatic.”
“What do they call it that for, Sally?”
“I don't know; but anyway it's royal, and royal only.”
“Then we will insist upon it. More—I will compel it. It is morganatic
marriage or none.”
“That settles it!” said Sally, rubbing his hands with delight. “And it will
be the very first in America. Aleck, it will make Newport sick.”
Then they fell silent, and drifted away upon their dream wings to the far
regions of the earth to invite all the crowned heads and their families and
provide gratis transportation to them.

CHAPTER VIII
During three days the couple walked upon air, with their heads in the
clouds. They were but vaguely conscious of their surroundings; they saw all
things dimly, as through a veil; they were steeped in dreams, often they did
not hear when they were spoken to; they often did not understand when
they heard; they answered confusedly or at random; Sally sold molasses by
weight, sugar by the yard, and furnished soap when asked for candles, and
Aleck put the cat in the wash and fed milk to the soiled linen. Everybody
was stunned and amazed, and went about muttering, “What can be the
matter with the Fosters?”
Three days. Then came events! Things had taken a happy turn, and for
forty-eight hours Aleck's imaginary corner had been booming. Up—up—
still up! Cost point was passed. Still up—and up—and up! Five points
above cost—then ten—fifteen—twenty! Twenty points cold profit on the
vast venture, now, and Aleck's imaginary brokers were shouting frantically
by imaginary long-distance, “Sell! sell! for Heaven's sake sell!”
She broke the splendid news to Sally, and he, too, said, “Sell! sell—oh,
don't make a blunder, now, you own the earth!—sell, sell!” But she set her
iron will and lashed it amidships, and said she would hold on for five points
more if she died for it.
It was a fatal resolve. The very next day came the historic crash, the
record crash, the devastating crash, when the bottom fell out of Wall Street,
and the whole body of gilt-edged stocks dropped ninety-five points in five
hours, and the multimillionaire was seen begging his bread in the Bowery.
Aleck sternly held her grip and “put up” as long as she could, but at last
there came a call which she was powerless to meet, and her imaginary
brokers sold her out. Then, and not till then, the man in her was vanished,
and the woman in her resumed sway. She put her arms about her husband's
neck and wept, saying:
“I am to blame, do not forgive me, I cannot bear it. We are paupers!
Paupers, and I am so miserable. The weddings will never come off; all that
is past; we could not even buy the dentist, now.”

A bitter reproach was on Sally's tongue: “I begged you to sell, but you—”
He did not say it; he had not the heart to add a hurt to that broken and
repentant spirit. A nobler thought came to him and he said:
“Bear up, my Aleck, all is not lost! You really never invested a penny of
my uncle's bequest, but only its unmaterialized future; what we have lost
was only the incremented harvest from that future by your incomparable
financial judgment and sagacity. Cheer up, banish these griefs; we still have
the thirty thousand untouched; and with the experience which you have
acquired, think what you will be able to do with it in a couple years! The
marriages are not off, they are only postponed.”
These were blessed words. Aleck saw how true they were, and their
influence was electric; her tears ceased to flow, and her great spirit rose to
its full stature again. With flashing eye and grateful heart, and with hand
uplifted in pledge and prophecy, she said:
“Now and here I proclaim—”
But she was interrupted by a visitor. It was the editor and proprietor of
the Sagamore. He had happened into Lakeside to pay a duty-call upon an
obscure grandmother of his who was nearing the end of her pilgrimage, and
with the idea of combining business with grief he had looked up the
Fosters, who had been so absorbed in other things for the past four years
that they neglected to pay up their subscription. Six dollars due. No visitor
could have been more welcome. He would know all about Uncle Tilbury
and what his chances might be getting to be, cemeterywards. They could, of
course, ask no questions, for that would squelch the bequest, but they could
nibble around on the edge of the subject and hope for results. The scheme
did not work. The obtuse editor did not know he was being nibbled at; but
at last, chance accomplished what art had failed in. In illustration of
something under discussion which required the help of metaphor, the editor
said:
“Land, it's as tough as Tilbury Foster!—as we say.”
It was sudden, and it made the Fosters jump. The editor noticed, and said,
apologetically:
“No harm intended, I assure you. It's just a saying; just a joke, you know
—nothing in it. Relation of yours?”

Sally crowded his burning eagerness down, and answered with all the
indifference he could assume:
“I—well, not that I know of, but we've heard of him.” The editor was
thankful, and resumed his composure. Sally added: “Is he—is he—well?”
“Is he well? Why, bless you he's in Sheol these five years!”
The Fosters were trembling with grief, though it felt like joy. Sally said,
non-committally—and tentatively:
“Ah, well, such is life, and none can escape—not even the rich are
spared.”
The editor laughed.
“If you are including Tilbury,” said he, “it don't apply. He hadn't a cent;
the town had to bury him.”
The Fosters sat petrified for two minutes; petrified and cold. Then, white-
faced and weak-voiced, Sally asked:
“Is it true? Do you know it to be true?”
“Well, I should say! I was one of the executors. He hadn't anything to
leave but a wheelbarrow, and he left that to me. It hadn't any wheel, and
wasn't any good. Still, it was something, and so, to square up, I scribbled off
a sort of a little obituarial send-off for him, but it got crowded out.”
The Fosters were not listening—their cup was full, it could contain no
more. They sat with bowed heads, dead to all things but the ache at their
hearts.
An hour later. Still they sat there, bowed, motionless, silent, the visitor
long ago gone, they unaware.
Then they stirred, and lifted their heads wearily, and gazed at each other
wistfully, dreamily, dazed; then presently began to twaddle to each other in
a wandering and childish way. At intervals they lapsed into silences, leaving
a sentence unfinished, seemingly either unaware of it or losing their way.
Sometimes, when they woke out of these silences they had a dim and
transient consciousness that something had happened to their minds; then
with a dumb and yearning solicitude they would softly caress each other's
hands in mutual compassion and support, as if they would say: “I am near
you, I will not forsake you, we will bear it together; somewhere there is

release and forgetfulness, somewhere there is a grave and peace; be patient,
it will not be long.”
They lived yet two years, in mental night, always brooding, steeped in
vague regrets and melancholy dreams, never speaking; then release came to
both on the same day.
Toward the end the darkness lifted from Sally's ruined mind for a
moment, and he said:
“Vast wealth, acquired by sudden and unwholesome means, is a snare. It
did us no good, transient were its feverish pleasures; yet for its sake we
threw away our sweet and simple and happy life—let others take warning
by us.”
He lay silent awhile, with closed eyes; then as the chill of death crept
upward toward his heart, and consciousness was fading from his brain, he
muttered:
“Money had brought him misery, and he took his revenge upon us, who
had done him no harm. He had his desire: with base and cunning
calculation he left us but thirty thousand, knowing we would try to increase
it, and ruin our life and break our hearts. Without added expense he could
have left us far above desire of increase, far above the temptation to
speculate, and a kinder soul would have done it; but in him was no generous
spirit, no pity, no—”

A DOG'S TALE

CHAPTER I
My father was a St. Bernard, my mother was a collie, but I am a
Presbyterian. This is what my mother told me, I do not know these nice
distinctions myself. To me they are only fine large words meaning nothing.
My mother had a fondness for such; she liked to say them, and see other
dogs look surprised and envious, as wondering how she got so much
education. But, indeed, it was not real education; it was only show: she got
the words by listening in the dining-room and drawing-room when there
was company, and by going with the children to Sunday-school and
listening there; and whenever she heard a large word she said it over to
herself many times, and so was able to keep it until there was a dogmatic
gathering in the neighborhood, then she would get it off, and surprise and
distress them all, from pocket-pup to mastiff, which rewarded her for all her
trouble. If there was a stranger he was nearly sure to be suspicious, and
when he got his breath again he would ask her what it meant. And she
always told him. He was never expecting this but thought he would catch
her; so when she told him, he was the one that looked ashamed, whereas he
had thought it was going to be she. The others were always waiting for this,
and glad of it and proud of her, for they knew what was going to happen,
because they had had experience. When she told the meaning of a big word
they were all so taken up with admiration that it never occurred to any dog
to doubt if it was the right one; and that was natural, because, for one thing,
she answered up so promptly that it seemed like a dictionary speaking, and
for another thing, where could they find out whether it was right or not? for
she was the only cultivated dog there was. By and by, when I was older, she
brought home the word Unintellectual, one time, and worked it pretty hard
all the week at different gatherings, making much unhappiness and
despondency; and it was at this time that I noticed that during that week she
was asked for the meaning at eight different assemblages, and flashed out a
fresh definition every time, which showed me that she had more presence of
mind than culture, though I said nothing, of course. She had one word
which she always kept on hand, and ready, like a life-preserver, a kind of
emergency word to strap on when she was likely to get washed overboard

in a sudden way—that was the word Synonymous. When she happened to
fetch out a long word which had had its day weeks before and its prepared
meanings gone to her dump-pile, if there was a stranger there of course it
knocked him groggy for a couple of minutes, then he would come to, and
by that time she would be away down wind on another tack, and not
expecting anything; so when he'd hail and ask her to cash in, I (the only dog
on the inside of her game) could see her canvas flicker a moment—but only
just a moment—then it would belly out taut and full, and she would say, as
calm as a summer's day, “It's synonymous with supererogation,” or some
godless long reptile of a word like that, and go placidly about and skim
away on the next tack, perfectly comfortable, you know, and leave that
stranger looking profane and embarrassed, and the initiated slatting the
floor with their tails in unison and their faces transfigured with a holy joy.
And it was the same with phrases. She would drag home a whole phrase,
if it had a grand sound, and play it six nights and two matinees, and explain
it a new way every time—which she had to, for all she cared for was the
phrase; she wasn't interested in what it meant, and knew those dogs hadn't
wit enough to catch her, anyway. Yes, she was a daisy! She got so she
wasn't afraid of anything, she had such confidence in the ignorance of those
creatures. She even brought anecdotes that she had heard the family and the
dinner-guests laugh and shout over; and as a rule she got the nub of one
chestnut hitched onto another chestnut, where, of course, it didn't fit and
hadn't any point; and when she delivered the nub she fell over and rolled on
the floor and laughed and barked in the most insane way, while I could see
that she was wondering to herself why it didn't seem as funny as it did when
she first heard it. But no harm was done; the others rolled and barked too,
privately ashamed of themselves for not seeing the point, and never
suspecting that the fault was not with them and there wasn't any to see.
You can see by these things that she was of a rather vain and frivolous
character; still, she had virtues, and enough to make up, I think. She had a
kind heart and gentle ways, and never harbored resentments for injuries
done her, but put them easily out of her mind and forgot them; and she
taught her children her kindly way, and from her we learned also to be
brave and prompt in time of danger, and not to run away, but face the peril
that threatened friend or stranger, and help him the best we could without
stopping to think what the cost might be to us. And she taught us not by
words only, but by example, and that is the best way and the surest and the

most lasting. Why, the brave things she did, the splendid things! she was
just a soldier; and so modest about it—well, you couldn't help admiring her,
and you couldn't help imitating her; not even a King Charles spaniel could
remain entirely despicable in her society. So, as you see, there was more to
her than her education.

CHAPTER II
When I was well grown, at last, I was sold and taken away, and I never
saw her again. She was broken-hearted, and so was I, and we cried; but she
comforted me as well as she could, and said we were sent into this world
for a wise and good purpose, and must do our duties without repining, take
our life as we might find it, live it for the best good of others, and never
mind about the results; they were not our affair. She said men who did like
this would have a noble and beautiful reward by and by in another world,
and although we animals would not go there, to do well and right without
reward would give to our brief lives a worthiness and dignity which in itself
would be a reward. She had gathered these things from time to time when
she had gone to the Sunday-school with the children, and had laid them up
in her memory more carefully than she had done with those other words and
phrases; and she had studied them deeply, for her good and ours. One may
see by this that she had a wise and thoughtful head, for all there was so
much lightness and vanity in it.
So we said our farewells, and looked our last upon each other through
our tears; and the last thing she said—keeping it for the last to make me
remember it the better, I think—was, “In memory of me, when there is a
time of danger to another do not think of yourself, think of your mother, and
do as she would do.”
Do you think I could forget that? No.

CHAPTER III
It was such a charming home!—my new one; a fine great house, with
pictures, and delicate decorations, and rich furniture, and no gloom
anywhere, but all the wilderness of dainty colors lit up with flooding
sunshine; and the spacious grounds around it, and the great garden—oh,
greensward, and noble trees, and flowers, no end! And I was the same as a
member of the family; and they loved me, and petted me, and did not give
me a new name, but called me by my old one that was dear to me because
my mother had given it me—Aileen Mavoureen. She got it out of a song;
and the Grays knew that song, and said it was a beautiful name.
Mrs. Gray was thirty, and so sweet and so lovely, you cannot imagine it;
and Sadie was ten, and just like her mother, just a darling slender little copy
of her, with auburn tails down her back, and short frocks; and the baby was
a year old, and plump and dimpled, and fond of me, and never could get
enough of hauling on my tail, and hugging me, and laughing out its
innocent happiness; and Mr. Gray was thirty-eight, and tall and slender and
handsome, a little bald in front, alert, quick in his movements, business-
like, prompt, decided, unsentimental, and with that kind of trim-chiseled
face that just seems to glint and sparkle with frosty intellectuality! He was a
renowned scientist. I do not know what the word means, but my mother
would know how to use it and get effects. She would know how to depress
a rat-terrier with it and make a lap-dog look sorry he came. But that is not
the best one; the best one was Laboratory. My mother could organize a
Trust on that one that would skin the tax-collars off the whole herd. The
laboratory was not a book, or a picture, or a place to wash your hands in, as
the college president's dog said—no, that is the lavatory; the laboratory is
quite different, and is filled with jars, and bottles, and electrics, and wires,
and strange machines; and every week other scientists came there and sat in
the place, and used the machines, and discussed, and made what they called
experiments and discoveries; and often I came, too, and stood around and
listened, and tried to learn, for the sake of my mother, and in loving
memory of her, although it was a pain to me, as realizing what she was

losing out of her life and I gaining nothing at all; for try as I might, I was
never able to make anything out of it at all.
Other times I lay on the floor in the mistress's work-room and slept, she
gently using me for a foot-stool, knowing it pleased me, for it was a caress;
other times I spent an hour in the nursery, and got well tousled and made
happy; other times I watched by the crib there, when the baby was asleep
and the nurse out for a few minutes on the baby's affairs; other times I
romped and raced through the grounds and the garden with Sadie till we
were tired out, then slumbered on the grass in the shade of a tree while she
read her book; other times I went visiting among the neighbor dogs—for
there were some most pleasant ones not far away, and one very handsome
and courteous and graceful one, a curly-haired Irish setter by the name of
Robin Adair, who was a Presbyterian like me, and belonged to the Scotch
minister.
The servants in our house were all kind to me and were fond of me, and
so, as you see, mine was a pleasant life. There could not be a happier dog
that I was, nor a gratefuler one. I will say this for myself, for it is only the
truth: I tried in all ways to do well and right, and honor my mother's
memory and her teachings, and earn the happiness that had come to me, as
best I could.
By and by came my little puppy, and then my cup was full, my happiness
was perfect. It was the dearest little waddling thing, and so smooth and soft
and velvety, and had such cunning little awkward paws, and such
affectionate eyes, and such a sweet and innocent face; and it made me so
proud to see how the children and their mother adored it, and fondled it, and
exclaimed over every little wonderful thing it did. It did seem to me that life
was just too lovely to—
Then came the winter. One day I was standing a watch in the nursery.
That is to say, I was asleep on the bed. The baby was asleep in the crib,
which was alongside the bed, on the side next the fireplace. It was the kind
of crib that has a lofty tent over it made of gauzy stuff that you can see
through. The nurse was out, and we two sleepers were alone. A spark from
the wood-fire was shot out, and it lit on the slope of the tent. I suppose a
quiet interval followed, then a scream from the baby awoke me, and there
was that tent flaming up toward the ceiling! Before I could think, I sprang
to the floor in my fright, and in a second was half-way to the door; but in

the next half-second my mother's farewell was sounding in my ears, and I
was back on the bed again., I reached my head through the flames and
dragged the baby out by the waist-band, and tugged it along, and we fell to
the floor together in a cloud of smoke; I snatched a new hold, and dragged
the screaming little creature along and out at the door and around the bend
of the hall, and was still tugging away, all excited and happy and proud,
when the master's voice shouted:
“Begone you cursed beast!” and I jumped to save myself; but he was
furiously quick, and chased me up, striking furiously at me with his cane, I
dodging this way and that, in terror, and at last a strong blow fell upon my
left foreleg, which made me shriek and fall, for the moment, helpless; the
cane went up for another blow, but never descended, for the nurse's voice
rang wildly out, “The nursery's on fire!” and the master rushed away in that
direction, and my other bones were saved.
The pain was cruel, but, no matter, I must not lose any time; he might
come back at any moment; so I limped on three legs to the other end of the
hall, where there was a dark little stairway leading up into a garret where
old boxes and such things were kept, as I had heard say, and where people
seldom went. I managed to climb up there, then I searched my way through
the dark among the piles of things, and hid in the secretest place I could
find. It was foolish to be afraid there, yet still I was; so afraid that I held in
and hardly even whimpered, though it would have been such a comfort to
whimper, because that eases the pain, you know. But I could lick my leg,
and that did some good.
For half an hour there was a commotion downstairs, and shoutings, and
rushing footsteps, and then there was quiet again. Quiet for some minutes,
and that was grateful to my spirit, for then my fears began to go down; and
fears are worse than pains—oh, much worse. Then came a sound that froze
me. They were calling me—calling me by name—hunting for me!
It was muffled by distance, but that could not take the terror out of it, and
it was the most dreadful sound to me that I had ever heard. It went all about,
everywhere, down there: along the halls, through all the rooms, in both
stories, and in the basement and the cellar; then outside, and farther and
farther away—then back, and all about the house again, and I thought it
would never, never stop. But at last it did, hours and hours after the vague
twilight of the garret had long ago been blotted out by black darkness.

Then in that blessed stillness my terrors fell little by little away, and I was
at peace and slept. It was a good rest I had, but I woke before the twilight
had come again. I was feeling fairly comfortable, and I could think out a
plan now. I made a very good one; which was, to creep down, all the way
down the back stairs, and hide behind the cellar door, and slip out and
escape when the iceman came at dawn, while he was inside filling the
refrigerator; then I would hide all day, and start on my journey when night
came; my journey to—well, anywhere where they would not know me and
betray me to the master. I was feeling almost cheerful now; then suddenly I
thought: Why, what would life be without my puppy!
That was despair. There was no plan for me; I saw that; I must say where
I was; stay, and wait, and take what might come—it was not my affair; that
was what life is—my mother had said it. Then—well, then the calling began
again! All my sorrows came back. I said to myself, the master will never
forgive. I did not know what I had done to make him so bitter and so
unforgiving, yet I judged it was something a dog could not understand, but
which was clear to a man and dreadful.
They called and called—days and nights, it seemed to me. So long that
the hunger and thirst near drove me mad, and I recognized that I was getting
very weak. When you are this way you sleep a great deal, and I did. Once I
woke in an awful fright—it seemed to me that the calling was right there in
the garret! And so it was: it was Sadie's voice, and she was crying; my name
was falling from her lips all broken, poor thing, and I could not believe my
ears for the joy of it when I heard her say:
“Come back to us—oh, come back to us, and forgive—it is all so sad
without our—”
I broke in with such a grateful little yelp, and the next moment Sadie was
plunging and stumbling through the darkness and the lumber and shouting
for the family to hear, “She's found, she's found!”
The days that followed—well, they were wonderful. The mother and
Sadie and the servants—why, they just seemed to worship me. They
couldn't seem to make me a bed that was fine enough; and as for food, they
couldn't be satisfied with anything but game and delicacies that were out of
season; and every day the friends and neighbors flocked in to hear about my
heroism—that was the name they called it by, and it means agriculture. I
remember my mother pulling it on a kennel once, and explaining it in that

way, but didn't say what agriculture was, except that it was synonymous
with intramural incandescence; and a dozen times a day Mrs. Gray and
Sadie would tell the tale to new-comers, and say I risked my life to save the
baby's, and both of us had burns to prove it, and then the company would
pass me around and pet me and exclaim about me, and you could see the
pride in the eyes of Sadie and her mother; and when the people wanted to
know what made me limp, they looked ashamed and changed the subject,
and sometimes when people hunted them this way and that way with
questions about it, it looked to me as if they were going to cry.
And this was not all the glory; no, the master's friends came, a whole
twenty of the most distinguished people, and had me in the laboratory, and
discussed me as if I was a kind of discovery; and some of them said it was
wonderful in a dumb beast, the finest exhibition of instinct they could call
to mind; but the master said, with vehemence, “It's far above instinct; it's
reason, and many a man, privileged to be saved and go with you and me to
a better world by right of its possession, has less of it that this poor silly
quadruped that's foreordained to perish”; and then he laughed, and said:
“Why, look at me—I'm a sarcasm! bless you, with all my grand
intelligence, the only thing I inferred was that the dog had gone mad and
was destroying the child, whereas but for the beast's intelligence—it's
reason, I tell you!—the child would have perished!”
They disputed and disputed, and I was the very center of subject of it all,
and I wished my mother could know that this grand honor had come to me;
it would have made her proud.
Then they discussed optics, as they called it, and whether a certain injury
to the brain would produce blindness or not, but they could not agree about
it, and said they must test it by experiment by and by; and next they
discussed plants, and that interested me, because in the summer Sadie and I
had planted seeds—I helped her dig the holes, you know—and after days
and days a little shrub or a flower came up there, and it was a wonder how
that could happen; but it did, and I wished I could talk—I would have told
those people about it and shown then how much I knew, and been all alive
with the subject; but I didn't care for the optics; it was dull, and when they
came back to it again it bored me, and I went to sleep.
Pretty soon it was spring, and sunny and pleasant and lovely, and the
sweet mother and the children patted me and the puppy good-by, and went

away on a journey and a visit to their kin, and the master wasn't any
company for us, but we played together and had good times, and the
servants were kind and friendly, so we got along quite happily and counted
the days and waited for the family.
And one day those men came again, and said, now for the test, and they
took the puppy to the laboratory, and I limped three-leggedly along, too,
feeling proud, for any attention shown to the puppy was a pleasure to me, of
course. They discussed and experimented, and then suddenly the puppy
shrieked, and they set him on the floor, and he went staggering around, with
his head all bloody, and the master clapped his hands and shouted:
“There, I've won—confess it! He's a blind as a bat!”
And they all said:
“It's so—you've proved your theory, and suffering humanity owes you a
great debt from henceforth,” and they crowded around him, and wrung his
hand cordially and thankfully, and praised him.
But I hardly saw or heard these things, for I ran at once to my little
darling, and snuggled close to it where it lay, and licked the blood, and it
put its head against mine, whimpering softly, and I knew in my heart it was
a comfort to it in its pain and trouble to feel its mother's touch, though it
could not see me. Then it dropped down, presently, and its little velvet nose
rested upon the floor, and it was still, and did not move any more.
Soon the master stopped discussing a moment, and rang in the footman,
and said, “Bury it in the far corner of the garden,” and then went on with
the discussion, and I trotted after the footman, very happy and grateful, for I
knew the puppy was out of its pain now, because it was asleep. We went far
down the garden to the farthest end, where the children and the nurse and
the puppy and I used to play in the summer in the shade of a great elm, and
there the footman dug a hole, and I saw he was going to plant the puppy,
and I was glad, because it would grow and come up a fine handsome dog,
like Robin Adair, and be a beautiful surprise for the family when they came
home; so I tried to help him dig, but my lame leg was no good, being stiff,
you know, and you have to have two, or it is no use. When the footman had
finished and covered little Robin up, he patted my head, and there were
tears in his eyes, and he said: “Poor little doggie, you saved his child!”

I have watched two whole weeks, and he doesn't come up! This last week
a fright has been stealing upon me. I think there is something terrible about
this. I do not know what it is, but the fear makes me sick, and I cannot eat,
though the servants bring me the best of food; and they pet me so, and even
come in the night, and cry, and say, “Poor doggie—do give it up and come
home; don't break our hearts!” and all this terrifies me the more, and makes
me sure something has happened. And I am so weak; since yesterday I
cannot stand on my feet anymore. And within this hour the servants,
looking toward the sun where it was sinking out of sight and the night chill
coming on, said things I could not understand, but they carried something
cold to my heart.

“Those poor creatures! They do not suspect. They will come home in the
morning, and eagerly ask for the little doggie that did the brave deed, and
who of us will be strong enough to say the truth to them: 'The humble little
friend is gone where go the beasts that perish.'”

WAS IT HEAVEN? OR HELL?

CHAPTER I
“You told a lie?”
“You confess it—you actually confess it—you told a lie!”

CHAPTER II
The family consisted of four persons: Margaret Lester, widow, aged thirty
six; Helen Lester, her daughter, aged sixteen; Mrs. Lester's maiden aunts,
Hannah and Hester Gray, twins, aged sixty-seven. Waking and sleeping, the
three women spent their days and nights in adoring the young girl; in
watching the movements of her sweet spirit in the mirror of her face; in
refreshing their souls with the vision of her bloom and beauty; in listening
to the music of her voice; in gratefully recognizing how rich and fair for
them was the world with this presence in it; in shuddering to think how
desolate it would be with this light gone out of it.
By nature—and inside—the aged aunts were utterly dear and lovable and
good, but in the matter of morals and conduct their training had been so
uncompromisingly strict that it had made them exteriorly austere, not to say
stern. Their influence was effective in the house; so effective that the
mother and the daughter conformed to its moral and religious requirements
cheerfully, contentedly, happily, unquestionably. To do this was become
second nature to them. And so in this peaceful heaven there were no
clashings, no irritations, no fault-finding, no heart-burnings.
In it a lie had no place. In it a lie was unthinkable. In it speech was
restricted to absolute truth, iron-bound truth, implacable and
uncompromising truth, let the resulting consequences be what they might.
At last, one day, under stress of circumstances, the darling of the house
sullied her lips with a lie—and confessed it, with tears and self-upbraidings.
There are not any words that can paint the consternation of the aunts. It was
as if the sky had crumpled up and collapsed and the earth had tumbled to
ruin with a crash. They sat side by side, white and stern, gazing speechless
upon the culprit, who was on her knees before them with her face buried
first in one lap and then the other, moaning and sobbing, and appealing for
sympathy and forgiveness and getting no response, humbly kissing the hand
of the one, then of the other, only to see it withdrawn as suffering
defilement by those soiled lips.
Twice, at intervals, Aunt Hester said, in frozen amazement:

“You told a lie?”
Twice, at intervals, Aunt Hannah followed with the muttered and amazed
ejaculation:
“You confess it—you actually confess it—you told a lie!”
It was all they could say. The situation was new, unheard of, incredible;
they could not understand it, they did not know how to take hold of it, it
approximately paralyzed speech.
At length it was decided that the erring child must be taken to her mother,
who was ill, and who ought to know what had happened. Helen begged,
besought, implored that she might be spared this further disgrace, and that
her mother might be spared the grief and pain of it; but this could not be:
duty required this sacrifice, duty takes precedence of all things, nothing can
absolve one from a duty, with a duty no compromise is possible.
Helen still begged, and said the sin was her own, her mother had had no
hand in it—why must she be made to suffer for it?
But the aunts were obdurate in their righteousness, and said the law that
visited the sins of the parent upon the child was by all right and reason
reversible; and therefore it was but just that the innocent mother of a
sinning child should suffer her rightful share of the grief and pain and
shame which were the allotted wages of the sin.
The three moved toward the sick-room.
At this time the doctor was approaching the house. He was still a good
distance away, however. He was a good doctor and a good man, and he had
a good heart, but one had to know him a year to get over hating him, two
years to learn to endure him, three to learn to like him, and four and five to
learn to love him. It was a slow and trying education, but it paid. He was of
great stature; he had a leonine head, a leonine face, a rough voice, and an
eye which was sometimes a pirate's and sometimes a woman's, according to
the mood. He knew nothing about etiquette, and cared nothing about it; in
speech, manner, carriage, and conduct he was the reverse of conventional.
He was frank, to the limit; he had opinions on all subjects; they were always
on tap and ready for delivery, and he cared not a farthing whether his
listener liked them or didn't. Whom he loved he loved, and manifested it;
whom he didn't love he hated, and published it from the housetops. In his
young days he had been a sailor, and the salt-airs of all the seas blew from

him yet. He was a sturdy and loyal Christian, and believed he was the best
one in the land, and the only one whose Christianity was perfectly sound,
healthy, full-charged with common sense, and had no decayed places in it.
People who had an ax to grind, or people who for any reason wanted to get
on the soft side of him, called him The Christian—a phrase whose delicate
flattery was music to his ears, and whose capital T was such an enchanting
and vivid object to him that he could see it when it fell out of a person's
mouth even in the dark. Many who were fond of him stood on their
consciences with both feet and brazenly called him by that large title
habitually, because it was a pleasure to them to do anything that would
please him; and with eager and cordial malice his extensive and diligently
cultivated crop of enemies gilded it, beflowered it, expanded it to “The only
Christian.” Of these two titles, the latter had the wider currency; the enemy,
being greatly in the majority, attended to that. Whatever the doctor believed,
he believed with all his heart, and would fight for it whenever he got the
chance; and if the intervals between chances grew to be irksomely wide, he
would invent ways of shortening them himself. He was severely
conscientious, according to his rather independent lights, and whatever he
took to be a duty he performed, no matter whether the judgment of the
professional moralists agreed with his own or not. At sea, in his young days,
he had used profanity freely, but as soon as he was converted he made a
rule, which he rigidly stuck to ever afterward, never to use it except on the
rarest occasions, and then only when duty commanded. He had been a hard
drinker at sea, but after his conversion he became a firm and outspoken
teetotaler, in order to be an example to the young, and from that time forth
he seldom drank; never, indeed, except when it seemed to him to be a duty
—a condition which sometimes occurred a couple of times a year, but never
as many as five times.
Necessarily, such a man is impressionable, impulsive, emotional. This
one was, and had no gift at hiding his feelings; or if he had it he took no
trouble to exercise it. He carried his soul's prevailing weather in his face,
and when he entered a room the parasols or the umbrellas went up—
figuratively speaking—according to the indications. When the soft light was
in his eye it meant approval, and delivered a benediction; when he came
with a frown he lowered the temperature ten degrees. He was a well-
beloved man in the house of his friends, but sometimes a dreaded one.

He had a deep affection for the Lester household and its several members
returned this feeling with interest. They mourned over his kind of
Christianity, and he frankly scoffed at theirs; but both parties went on
loving each other just the same.
He was approaching the house—out of the distance; the aunts and the
culprit were moving toward the sick-chamber.

CHAPTER III
The three last named stood by the bed; the aunts austere, the transgressor
softly sobbing. The mother turned her head on the pillow; her tired eyes
flamed up instantly with sympathy and passionate mother-love when they
fell upon her child, and she opened the refuge and shelter of her arms.
“Wait!” said Aunt Hannah, and put out her hand and stayed the girl from
leaping into them.
“Helen,” said the other aunt, impressively, “tell your mother all. Purge
your soul; leave nothing unconfessed.”
Standing stricken and forlorn before her judges, the young girl mourned
her sorrowful tale through the end, then in a passion of appeal cried out:
“Oh, mother, can't you forgive me? won't you forgive me?—I am so
desolate!”
“Forgive you, my darling? Oh, come to my arms!—there, lay your head
upon my breast, and be at peace. If you had told a thousand lies—”
There was a sound—a warning—the clearing of a throat. The aunts
glanced up, and withered in their clothes—there stood the doctor, his face a
thunder-cloud. Mother and child knew nothing of his presence; they lay
locked together, heart to heart, steeped in immeasurable content, dead to all
things else. The physician stood many moments glaring and glooming upon
the scene before him; studying it, analyzing it, searching out its genesis;
then he put up his hand and beckoned to the aunts. They came trembling to
him, and stood humbly before him and waited. He bent down and
whispered:
“Didn't I tell you this patient must be protected from all excitement?
What the hell have you been doing? Clear out of the place!”
They obeyed. Half an hour later he appeared in the parlor, serene, cheery,
clothed in sunshine, conducting Helen, with his arm about her waist, petting
her, and saying gentle and playful things to her; and she also was her sunny
and happy self again.

“Now, then;” he said, “good-by, dear. Go to your room, and keep away
from your mother, and behave yourself. But wait—put out your tongue.
There, that will do—you're as sound as a nut!” He patted her cheek and
added, “Run along now; I want to talk to these aunts.”
She went from the presence. His face clouded over again at once; and as
he sat down he said:
“You too have been doing a lot of damage—and maybe some good.
Some good, yes—such as it is. That woman's disease is typhoid! You've
brought it to a show-up, I think, with your insanities, and that's a service—
such as it is. I hadn't been able to determine what it was before.”
With one impulse the old ladies sprang to their feet, quaking with terror.
“Sit down! What are you proposing to do?”
“Do? We must fly to her. We—”
“You'll do nothing of the kind; you've done enough harm for one day. Do
you want to squander all your capital of crimes and follies on a single deal?
Sit down, I tell you. I have arranged for her to sleep; she needs it; if you
disturb her without my orders, I'll brain you—if you've got the materials for
it.”
They sat down, distressed and indignant, but obedient, under compulsion.
He proceeded:
“Now, then, I want this case explained. They wanted to explain it to me—
as if there hadn't been emotion or excitement enough already. You knew my
orders; how did you dare to go in there and get up that riot?”
Hester looked appealing at Hannah; Hannah returned a beseeching look
at Hester—neither wanted to dance to this unsympathetic orchestra. The
doctor came to their help. He said:
“Begin, Hester.”
Fingering at the fringes of her shawl, and with lowered eyes, Hester said,
timidly:
“We should not have disobeyed for any ordinary cause, but this was vital.
This was a duty. With a duty one has no choice; one must put all lighter
considerations aside and perform it. We were obliged to arraign her before
her mother. She had told a lie.”

The doctor glowered upon the woman a moment, and seemed to be trying
to work up in his mind an understanding of a wholly incomprehensible
proposition; then he stormed out:
“She told a lie! did she? God bless my soul! I tell a million a day! And so
does every doctor. And so does everybody—including you—for that matter.
And that was the important thing that authorized you to venture to disobey
my orders and imperil that woman's life! Look here, Hester Gray, this is
pure lunacy; that girl couldn't tell a lie that was intended to injure a person.
The thing is impossible—absolutely impossible. You know it yourselves—
both of you; you know it perfectly well.”
Hannah came to her sister's rescue:
“Hester didn't mean that it was that kind of a lie, and it wasn't. But it was
a lie.”
“Well, upon my word, I never heard such nonsense! Haven't you got
sense enough to discriminate between lies! Don't you know the difference
between a lie that helps and a lie that hurts?”
“All lies are sinful,” said Hannah, setting her lips together like a vise; “all
lies are forbidden.”
The Only Christian fidgeted impatiently in his chair. He went to attack
this proposition, but he did not quite know how or where to begin. Finally
he made a venture:
“Hester, wouldn't you tell a lie to shield a person from an undeserved
injury or shame?”
“No.”
“Not even a friend?”
“No.”
“Not even your dearest friend?”
“No. I would not.”
The doctor struggled in silence awhile with this situation; then he asked:
“Not even to save him from bitter pain and misery and grief?”
“No. Not even to save his life.”
Another pause. Then:
“Nor his soul?”

There was a hush—a silence which endured a measurable interval—then
Hester answered, in a low voice, but with decision:
“Nor his soul?”
No one spoke for a while; then the doctor said:
“Is it with you the same, Hannah?”
“Yes,” she answered.
“I ask you both—why?”
“Because to tell such a lie, or any lie, is a sin, and could cost us the loss
of our own souls—would, indeed, if we died without time to repent.”
“Strange... strange... it is past belief.” Then he asked, roughly: “Is such a
soul as that worth saving?” He rose up, mumbling and grumbling, and
started for the door, stumping vigorously along. At the threshold he turned
and rasped out an admonition: “Reform! Drop this mean and sordid and
selfish devotion to the saving of your shabby little souls, and hunt up
something to do that's got some dignity to it! Risk your souls! risk them in
good causes; then if you lose them, why should you care? Reform!”
The good old gentlewomen sat paralyzed, pulverized, outraged, insulted,
and brooded in bitterness and indignation over these blasphemies. They
were hurt to the heart, poor old ladies, and said they could never forgive
these injuries.
“Reform!”
They kept repeating that word resentfully. “Reform—and learn to tell
lies!”
Time slipped along, and in due course a change came over their spirits.
They had completed the human being's first duty—which is to think about
himself until he has exhausted the subject, then he is in a condition to take
up minor interests and think of other people. This changes the complexion
of his spirits—generally wholesomely. The minds of the two old ladies
reverted to their beloved niece and the fearful disease which had smitten
her; instantly they forgot the hurts their self-love had received, and a
passionate desire rose in their hearts to go to the help of the sufferer and
comfort her with their love, and minister to her, and labor for her the best
they could with their weak hands, and joyfully and affectionately wear out
their poor old bodies in her dear service if only they might have the
privilege.

“And we shall have it!” said Hester, with the tears running down her face.
“There are no nurses comparable to us, for there are no others that will
stand their watch by that bed till they drop and die, and God knows we
would do that.”
“Amen,” said Hannah, smiling approval and endorsement through the
mist of moisture that blurred her glasses. “The doctor knows us, and knows
we will not disobey again; and he will call no others. He will not dare!”
“Dare?” said Hester, with temper, and dashing the water from her eyes;
“he will dare anything—that Christian devil! But it will do no good for him
to try it this time—but, laws! Hannah! after all's said and done, he is gifted
and wise and good, and he would not think of such a thing.... It is surely
time for one of us to go to that room. What is keeping him? Why doesn't he
come and say so?”
They caught the sound of his approaching step. He entered, sat down, and
began to talk.
“Margaret is a sick woman,” he said. “She is still sleeping, but she will
wake presently; then one of you must go to her. She will be worse before
she is better. Pretty soon a night-and-day watch must be set. How much of it
can you two undertake?”
“All of it!” burst from both ladies at once.
The doctor's eyes flashed, and he said, with energy:
“You do ring true, you brave old relics! And you shall do all of the
nursing you can, for there's none to match you in that divine office in this
town; but you can't do all of it, and it would be a crime to let you.” It was
grand praise, golden praise, coming from such a source, and it took nearly
all the resentment out of the aged twin's hearts. “Your Tilly and my old
Nancy shall do the rest—good nurses both, white souls with black skins,
watchful, loving, tender—just perfect nurses!—and competent liars from
the cradle.... Look you! keep a little watch on Helen; she is sick, and is
going to be sicker.”
The ladies looked a little surprised, and not credulous; and Hester said:
“How is that? It isn't an hour since you said she was as sound as a nut.”
The doctor answered, tranquilly:
“It was a lie.”

The ladies turned upon him indignantly, and Hannah said:
“How can you make an odious confession like that, in so indifferent a
tone, when you know how we feel about all forms of—”
“Hush! You are as ignorant as cats, both of you, and you don't know what
you are talking about. You are like all the rest of the moral moles; you lie
from morning till night, but because you don't do it with your mouths, but
only with your lying eyes, your lying inflections, your deceptively
misplaced emphasis, and your misleading gestures, you turn up your
complacent noses and parade before God and the world as saintly and
unsmirched Truth-Speakers, in whose cold-storage souls a lie would freeze
to death if it got there! Why will you humbug yourselves with that foolish
notion that no lie is a lie except a spoken one? What is the difference
between lying with your eyes and lying with your mouth? There is none;
and if you would reflect a moment you would see that it is so. There isn't a
human being that doesn't tell a gross of lies every day of his life; and you—
why, between you, you tell thirty thousand; yet you flare up here in a lurid
hypocritical horror because I tell that child a benevolent and sinless lie to
protect her from her imagination, which would get to work and warm up
her blood to a fever in an hour, if I were disloyal enough to my duty to let it.
Which I should probably do if I were interested in saving my soul by such
disreputable means.
“Come, let us reason together. Let us examine details. When you two
were in the sick-room raising that riot, what would you have done if you
had known I was coming?”
“Well, what?”
“You would have slipped out and carried Helen with you—wouldn't
you?”
The ladies were silent.
“What would be your object and intention?”
“Well, what?”
“To keep me from finding out your guilt; to beguile me to infer that
Margaret's excitement proceeded from some cause not known to you. In a
word, to tell me a lie—a silent lie. Moreover, a possibly harmful one.”
The twins colored, but did not speak.

“You not only tell myriads of silent lies, but you tell lies with your
mouths—you two.”
“That is not so!”
“It is so. But only harmless ones. You never dream of uttering a harmful
one. Do you know that that is a concession—and a confession?”
“How do you mean?”
“It is an unconscious concession that harmless lies are not criminal; it is a
confession that you constantly make that discrimination. For instance, you
declined old Mrs. Foster's invitation last week to meet those odious Higbies
at supper—in a polite note in which you expressed regret and said you were
very sorry you could not go. It was a lie. It was as unmitigated a lie as was
ever uttered. Deny it, Hester—with another lie.”
Hester replied with a toss of her head.
“That will not do. Answer. Was it a lie, or wasn't it?”
The color stole into the cheeks of both women, and with a struggle and
an effort they got out their confession:
“It was a lie.”
“Good—the reform is beginning; there is hope for you yet; you will not
tell a lie to save your dearest friend's soul, but you will spew out one
without a scruple to save yourself the discomfort of telling an unpleasant
truth.”
He rose. Hester, speaking for both, said; coldly:
“We have lied; we perceive it; it will occur no more. To lie is a sin. We
shall never tell another one of any kind whatsoever, even lies of courtesy or
benevolence, to save any one a pang or a sorrow decreed for him by God.”
“Ah, how soon you will fall! In fact, you have fallen already; for what
you have just uttered is a lie. Good-by. Reform! One of you go to the sick-
room now.”

CHAPTER IV
Twelve days later.
Mother and child were lingering in the grip of the hideous disease. Of
hope for either there was little. The aged sisters looked white and worn, but
they would not give up their posts. Their hearts were breaking, poor old
things, but their grit was steadfast and indestructible. All the twelve days
the mother had pined for the child, and the child for the mother, but both
knew that the prayer of these longings could not be granted. When the
mother was told—on the first day—that her disease was typhoid, she was
frightened, and asked if there was danger that Helen could have contracted
it the day before, when she was in the sick-chamber on that confession visit.
Hester told her the doctor had poo-pooed the idea. It troubled Hester to say
it, although it was true, for she had not believed the doctor; but when she
saw the mother's joy in the news, the pain in her conscience lost something
of its force—a result which made her ashamed of the constructive deception
which she had practiced, though not ashamed enough to make her distinctly
and definitely wish she had refrained from it. From that moment the sick
woman understood that her daughter must remain away, and she said she
would reconcile herself to the separation the best she could, for she would
rather suffer death than have her child's health imperiled. That afternoon
Helen had to take to her bed, ill. She grew worse during the night. In the
morning her mother asked after her:
“Is she well?”
Hester turned cold; she opened her lips, but the words refused to come.
The mother lay languidly looking, musing, waiting; suddenly she turned
white and gasped out:
“Oh, my God! what is it? is she sick?”
Then the poor aunt's tortured heart rose in rebellion, and words came:
“No—be comforted; she is well.”
The sick woman put all her happy heart in her gratitude:
“Thank God for those dear words! Kiss me. How I worship you for
saying them!”

Hester told this incident to Hannah, who received it with a rebuking look,
and said, coldly:
“Sister, it was a lie.”
Hester's lips trembled piteously; she choked down a sob, and said:
“Oh, Hannah, it was a sin, but I could not help it. I could not endure the
fright and the misery that were in her face.”
“No matter. It was a lie. God will hold you to account for it.”
“Oh, I know it, I know it,” cried Hester, wringing her hands, “but even if
it were now, I could not help it. I know I should do it again.”
“Then take my place with Helen in the morning. I will make the report
myself.”
Hester clung to her sister, begging and imploring.
“Don't, Hannah, oh, don't—you will kill her.”
“I will at least speak the truth.”
In the morning she had a cruel report to bear to the mother, and she
braced herself for the trial. When she returned from her mission, Hester was
waiting, pale and trembling, in the hall. She whispered:
“Oh, how did she take it—that poor, desolate mother?”
Hannah's eyes were swimming in tears. She said:
“God forgive me, I told her the child was well!”
Hester gathered her to her heart, with a grateful “God bless you,
Hannah!” and poured out her thankfulness in an inundation of worshiping
praises.
After that, the two knew the limit of their strength, and accepted their
fate. They surrendered humbly, and abandoned themselves to the hard
requirements of the situation. Daily they told the morning lie, and confessed
their sin in prayer; not asking forgiveness, as not being worthy of it, but
only wishing to make record that they realized their wickedness and were
not desiring to hide it or excuse it.
Daily, as the fair young idol of the house sank lower and lower, the
sorrowful old aunts painted her glowing bloom and her fresh young beauty
to the wan mother, and winced under the stabs her ecstasies of joy and
gratitude gave them.

In the first days, while the child had strength to hold a pencil, she wrote
fond little love-notes to her mother, in which she concealed her illness; and
these the mother read and reread through happy eyes wet with thankful
tears, and kissed them over and over again, and treasured them as precious
things under her pillow.
Then came a day when the strength was gone from the hand, and the
mind wandered, and the tongue babbled pathetic incoherences. This was a
sore dilemma for the poor aunts. There were no love-notes for the mother.
They did not know what to do. Hester began a carefully studied and
plausible explanation, but lost the track of it and grew confused; suspicion
began to show in the mother's face, then alarm. Hester saw it, recognized
the imminence of the danger, and descended to the emergency, pulling
herself resolutely together and plucking victory from the open jaws of
defeat. In a placid and convincing voice she said:
“I thought it might distress you to know it, but Helen spent the night at
the Sloanes'. There was a little party there, and, although she did not want to
go, and you so sick, we persuaded her, she being young and needing the
innocent pastimes of youth, and we believing you would approve. Be sure
she will write the moment she comes.”
“How good you are, and how dear and thoughtful for us both! Approve?
Why, I thank you with all my heart. My poor little exile! Tell her I want her
to have every pleasure she can—I would not rob her of one. Only let her
keep her health, that is all I ask. Don't let that suffer; I could not bear it.
How thankful I am that she escaped this infection—and what a narrow risk
she ran, Aunt Hester! Think of that lovely face all dulled and burned with
fever. I can't bear the thought of it. Keep her health. Keep her bloom! I can
see her now, the dainty creature—with the big, blue, earnest eyes; and
sweet, oh, so sweet and gentle and winning! Is she as beautiful as ever, dear
Aunt Hester?”
“Oh, more beautiful and bright and charming than ever she was before, if
such a thing can be”—and Hester turned away and fumbled with the
medicine-bottles, to hide her shame and grief.

CHAPTER V
After a little, both aunts were laboring upon a difficult and baffling work
in Helen's chamber. Patiently and earnestly, with their stiff old fingers, they
were trying to forge the required note. They made failure after failure, but
they improved little by little all the time. The pity of it all, the pathetic
humor of it, there was none to see; they themselves were unconscious of it.
Often their tears fell upon the notes and spoiled them; sometimes a single
misformed word made a note risky which could have been ventured but for
that; but at last Hannah produced one whose script was a good enough
imitation of Helen's to pass any but a suspicious eye, and bountifully
enriched it with the petting phrases and loving nicknames that had been
familiar on the child's lips from her nursery days. She carried it to the
mother, who took it with avidity, and kissed it, and fondled it, reading its
precious words over and over again, and dwelling with deep contentment
upon its closing paragraph:
“Mousie darling, if I could only see you, and kiss your eyes, and feel
your arms about me! I am so glad my practicing does not disturb you. Get
well soon. Everybody is good to me, but I am so lonesome without you,
dear mamma.”
“The poor child, I know just how she feels. She cannot be quite happy
without me; and I—oh, I live in the light of her eyes! Tell her she must
practice all she pleases; and, Aunt Hannah—tell her I can't hear the piano
this far, nor her dear voice when she sings: God knows I wish I could. No
one knows how sweet that voice is to me; and to think—some day it will be
silent! What are you crying for?”
“Only because—because—it was just a memory. When I came away she
was singing, 'Loch Lomond.' The pathos of it! It always moves me so when
she sings that.”
“And me, too. How heartbreakingly beautiful it is when some youthful
sorrow is brooding in her breast and she sings it for the mystic healing it
brings.... Aunt Hannah?”
“Dear Margaret?”

“I am very ill. Sometimes it comes over me that I shall never hear that
dear voice again.”
“Oh, don't—don't, Margaret! I can't bear it!”
Margaret was moved and distressed, and said, gently:
“There—there—let me put my arms around you. Don't cry. There—put
your cheek to mine. Be comforted. I wish to live. I will live if I can. Ah,
what could she do without me!... Does she often speak of me?—but I know
she does.”
“Oh, all the time—all the time!”
“My sweet child! She wrote the note the moment she came home?”
“Yes—the first moment. She would not wait to take off her things.”
“I knew it. It is her dear, impulsive, affectionate way. I knew it without
asking, but I wanted to hear you say it. The petted wife knows she is loved,
but she makes her husband tell her so every day, just for the joy of hearing
it.... She used the pen this time. That is better; the pencil-marks could rub
out, and I should grieve for that. Did you suggest that she use the pen?”
“Y—no—she—it was her own idea.”
The mother looked her pleasure, and said:
“I was hoping you would say that. There was never such a dear and
thoughtful child!... Aunt Hannah?”
“Dear Margaret?”
“Go and tell her I think of her all the time, and worship her. Why—you
are crying again. Don't be so worried about me, dear; I think there is
nothing to fear, yet.”
The grieving messenger carried her message, and piously delivered it to
unheeding ears. The girl babbled on unaware; looking up at her with
wondering and startled eyes flaming with fever, eyes in which was no light
of recognition:
“Are you—no, you are not my mother. I want her—oh, I want her! She
was here a minute ago—I did not see her go. Will she come? will she come
quickly? will she come now?... There are so many houses ... and they
oppress me so... and everything whirls and turns and whirls... oh, my head,
my head!”—and so she wandered on and on, in her pain, flitting from one

torturing fancy to another, and tossing her arms about in a weary and
ceaseless persecution of unrest.
Poor old Hannah wetted the parched lips and softly stroked the hot brow,
murmuring endearing and pitying words, and thanking the Father of all that
the mother was happy and did not know.

CHAPTER VI
Daily the child sank lower and steadily lower towards the grave, and
daily the sorrowing old watchers carried gilded tidings of her radiant health
and loveliness to the happy mother, whose pilgrimage was also now nearing
its end. And daily they forged loving and cheery notes in the child's hand,
and stood by with remorseful consciences and bleeding hearts, and wept to
see the grateful mother devour them and adore them and treasure them
away as things beyond price, because of their sweet source, and sacred
because her child's hand had touched them.
At last came that kindly friend who brings healing and peace to all. The
lights were burning low. In the solemn hush which precedes the dawn vague
figures flitted soundless along the dim hall and gathered silent and awed in
Helen's chamber, and grouped themselves about her bed, for a warning had
gone forth, and they knew. The dying girl lay with closed lids, and
unconscious, the drapery upon her breast faintly rising and falling as her
wasting life ebbed away. At intervals a sigh or a muffled sob broke upon the
stillness. The same haunting thought was in all minds there: the pity of this
death, the going out into the great darkness, and the mother not here to help
and hearten and bless.
Helen stirred; her hands began to grope wistfully about as if they sought
something—she had been blind some hours. The end was come; all knew it.
With a great sob Hester gathered her to her breast, crying, “Oh, my child,
my darling!” A rapturous light broke in the dying girl's face, for it was
mercifully vouchsafed her to mistake those sheltering arms for another's;
and she went to her rest murmuring, “Oh, mamma, I am so happy—I
longed for you—now I can die.”
Two hours later Hester made her report. The mother asked:
“How is it with the child?”
“She is well.”

CHAPTER VII
A sheaf of white crape and black was hung upon the door of the house,
and there it swayed and rustled in the wind and whispered its tidings. At
noon the preparation of the dead was finished, and in the coffin lay the fair
young form, beautiful, and in the sweet face a great peace. Two mourners
sat by it, grieving and worshipping—Hannah and the black woman Tilly.
Hester came, and she was trembling, for a great trouble was upon her spirit.
She said:
“She asks for a note.”
Hannah's face blanched. She had not thought of this; it had seemed that
that pathetic service was ended. But she realized now that that could not be.
For a little while the two women stood looking into each other's face, with
vacant eyes; then Hannah said:
“There is no way out of it—she must have it; she will suspect, else.”
“And she would find out.”
“Yes. It would break her heart.” She looked at the dead face, and her eyes
filled. “I will write it,” she said.
Hester carried it. The closing line said:
“Darling Mousie, dear sweet mother, we shall soon be together again. Is
not that good news? And it is true; they all say it is true.”
The mother mourned, saying:
“Poor child, how will she bear it when she knows? I shall never see her
again in life. It is hard, so hard. She does not suspect? You guard her from
that?”
“She thinks you will soon be well.”
“How good you are, and careful, dear Aunt Hester! None goes near her
who could carry the infection?”
“It would be a crime.”
“But you see her?”
“With a distance between—yes.”

“That is so good. Others one could not trust; but you two guardian angels
—steel is not so true as you. Others would be unfaithful; and many would
deceive, and lie.”
Hester's eyes fell, and her poor old lips trembled.
“Let me kiss you for her, Aunt Hester; and when I am gone, and the
danger is past, place the kiss upon her dear lips some day, and say her
mother sent it, and all her mother's broken heart is in it.”
Within the hour, Hester, raining tears upon the dead face, performed her
pathetic mission.

CHAPTER VIII
Another day dawned, and grew, and spread its sunshine in the earth. Aunt
Hannah brought comforting news to the failing mother, and a happy note,
which said again, “We have but a little time to wait, darling mother, then we
shall be together.”
The deep note of a bell came moaning down the wind.
“Aunt Hannah, it is tolling. Some poor soul is at rest. As I shall be soon.
You will not let her forget me?”
“Oh, God knows she never will!”
“Do not you hear strange noises, Aunt Hannah? It sounds like the
shuffling of many feet.”
“We hoped you would not hear it, dear. It is a little company gathering,
for—for Helen's sake, poor little prisoner. There will be music—and she
loves it so. We thought you would not mind.”
“Mind? Oh no, no—oh, give her everything her dear heart can desire.
How good you two are to her, and how good to me! God bless you both
always!”
After a listening pause:
“How lovely! It is her organ. Is she playing it herself, do you think?”
Faint and rich and inspiring the chords floating to her ears on the still air.
“Yes, it is her touch, dear heart, I recognize it. They are singing. Why—it is
a hymn! and the sacredest of all, the most touching, the most consoling.... It
seems to open the gates of paradise to me.... If I could die now....”
Faint and far the words rose out of the stillness:

Nearer, my God, to Thee,

Nearer to Thee,

E'en though it be a cross

That raiseth me.

With the closing of the hymn another soul passed to its rest, and they that
had been one in life were not sundered in death. The sisters, mourning and
rejoicing, said:
“How blessed it was that she never knew!”

CHAPTER IX
At midnight they sat together, grieving, and the angel of the Lord
appeared in the midst transfigured with a radiance not of earth; and
speaking, said:
“For liars a place is appointed. There they burn in the fires of hell from
everlasting unto everlasting. Repent!”
The bereaved fell upon their knees before him and clasped their hands
and bowed their gray heads, adoring. But their tongues clove to the roof of
their mouths, and they were dumb.
“Speak! that I may bear the message to the chancery of heaven and bring
again the decree from which there is no appeal.”
Then they bowed their heads yet lower, and one said:
“Our sin is great, and we suffer shame; but only perfect and final
repentance can make us whole; and we are poor creatures who have learned
our human weakness, and we know that if we were in those hard straits
again our hearts would fail again, and we should sin as before. The strong
could prevail, and so be saved, but we are lost.”
They lifted their heads in supplication. The angel was gone. While they
marveled and wept he came again; and bending low, he whispered the
decree.

CHAPTER X
Was it Heaven? Or Hell?

A CURE FOR THE BLUES
By courtesy of Mr. Cable I came into possession of a singular book eight
or ten years ago. It is likely that mine is now the only copy in existence. Its
title-page, unabbreviated, reads as follows:
“The Enemy Conquered; or, Love Triumphant. By G. Ragsdale
McClintock, (1) author of 'An Address,' etc., delivered at Sunflower Hill,
South Carolina, and member of the Yale Law School. New Haven:
published by T. H. Pease, 83 Chapel Street, 1845.”
No one can take up this book and lay it down again unread. Whoever
reads one line of it is caught, is chained; he has become the contented slave
of its fascinations; and he will read and read, devour and devour, and will
not let it go out of his hand till it is finished to the last line, though the
house be on fire over his head. And after a first reading he will not throw it
aside, but will keep it by him, with his Shakespeare and his Homer, and will
take it up many and many a time, when the world is dark and his spirits are
low, and be straightway cheered and refreshed. Yet this work has been
allowed to lie wholly neglected, unmentioned, and apparently unregretted,
for nearly half a century.
The reader must not imagine that he is to find in it wisdom, brilliancy,
fertility of invention, ingenuity of construction, excellence of form, purity
of style, perfection of imagery, truth to nature, clearness of statement,
humanly possible situations, humanly possible people, fluent narrative,
connected sequence of events—or philosophy, or logic, or sense. No; the
rich, deep, beguiling charm of the book lies in the total and miraculous
absence from it of all these qualities—a charm which is completed and
perfected by the evident fact that the author, whose naive innocence easily
and surely wins our regard, and almost our worship, does not know that
they are absent, does not even suspect that they are absent. When read by
the light of these helps to an understanding of the situation, the book is
delicious—profoundly and satisfyingly delicious.
I call it a book because the author calls it a book, I call it a work because
he calls it a work; but, in truth, it is merely a duodecimo pamphlet of thirty-

one pages. It was written for fame and money, as the author very frankly—
yes, and very hopefully, too, poor fellow—says in his preface. The money
never came—no penny of it ever came; and how long, how pathetically
long, the fame has been deferred—forty-seven years! He was young then, it
would have been so much to him then; but will he care for it now?
As time is measured in America, McClintock's epoch is antiquity. In his
long-vanished day the Southern author had a passion for “eloquence”; it
was his pet, his darling. He would be eloquent, or perish. And he recognized
only one kind of eloquence—the lurid, the tempestuous, the volcanic. He
liked words—big words, fine words, grand words, rumbling, thundering,
reverberating words; with sense attaching if it could be got in without
marring the sound, but not otherwise. He loved to stand up before a dazed
world, and pour forth flame and smoke and lava and pumice-stone into the
skies, and work his subterranean thunders, and shake himself with
earthquakes, and stench himself with sulphur fumes. If he consumed his
own fields and vineyards, that was a pity, yes; but he would have his
eruption at any cost. Mr. McClintock's eloquence—and he is always
eloquent, his crater is always spouting—is of the pattern common to his
day, but he departs from the custom of the time in one respect: his brethren
allowed sense to intrude when it did not mar the sound, but he does not
allow it to intrude at all. For example, consider this figure, which he used in
the village “Address” referred to with such candid complacency in the title-
page above quoted—“like the topmost topaz of an ancient tower.” Please
read it again; contemplate it; measure it; walk around it; climb up it; try to
get at an approximate realization of the size of it. Is the fellow to that to be
found in literature, ancient or modern, foreign or domestic, living or dead,
drunk or sober? One notices how fine and grand it sounds. We know that if
it was loftily uttered, it got a noble burst of applause from the villagers; yet
there isn't a ray of sense in it, or meaning to it.
McClintock finished his education at Yale in 1843, and came to Hartford
on a visit that same year. I have talked with men who at that time talked
with him, and felt of him, and knew he was real. One needs to remember
that fact and to keep fast hold of it; it is the only way to keep McClintock's
book from undermining one's faith in McClintock's actuality.
As to the book. The first four pages are devoted to an inflamed eulogy of
Woman—simply Woman in general, or perhaps as an Institution—wherein,

among other compliments to her details, he pays a unique one to her voice.
He says it “fills the breast with fond alarms, echoed by every rill.” It sounds
well enough, but it is not true. After the eulogy he takes up his real work
and the novel begins. It begins in the woods, near the village of Sunflower
Hill.
Brightening clouds seemed to rise from the mist of the fair
Chattahoochee, to spread their beauty over the thick forest, to guide
the hero whose bosom beats with aspirations to conquer the enemy
that would tarnish his name, and to win back the admiration of his
long-tried friend.

It seems a general remark, but it is not general; the hero mentioned is the
to-be hero of the book; and in this abrupt fashion, and without name or
description, he is shoveled into the tale. “With aspirations to conquer the
enemy that would tarnish his name” is merely a phrase flung in for the sake
of the sound—let it not mislead the reader. No one is trying to tarnish this
person; no one has thought of it. The rest of the sentence is also merely a
phrase; the man has no friend as yet, and of course has had no chance to try
him, or win back his admiration, or disturb him in any other way.
The hero climbs up over “Sawney's Mountain,” and down the other side,
making for an old Indian “castle”—which becomes “the red man's hut” in
the next sentence; and when he gets there at last, he “surveys with wonder
and astonishment” the invisible structure, “which time has buried in the
dust, and thought to himself his happiness was not yet complete.” One
doesn't know why it wasn't, nor how near it came to being complete, nor
what was still wanting to round it up and make it so. Maybe it was the
Indian; but the book does not say. At this point we have an episode:
Beside the shore of the brook sat a young man, about eighteen or
twenty, who seemed to be reading some favorite book, and who had a
remarkably noble countenance—eyes which betrayed more than a
common mind. This of course made the youth a welcome guest, and
gained him friends in whatever condition of his life he might be
placed. The traveler observed that he was a well-built figure which
showed strength and grace in every movement. He accordingly
addressed him in quite a gentlemanly manner, and inquired of him the
way to the village. After he had received the desired information, and
was about taking his leave, the youth said, “Are you not Major
Elfonzo, the great musician (2)—the champion of a noble cause—the
modern Achilles, who gained so many victories in the Florida War?” “I
bear that name,” said the Major, “and those titles, trusting at the same
time that the ministers of grace will carry me triumphantly through all

my laudable undertakings, and if,” continued the Major, “you, sir, are
the patronizer of noble deeds, I should like to make you my confidant
and learn your address.” The youth looked somewhat amazed, bowed
low, mused for a moment, and began: “My name is Roswell. I have
been recently admitted to the bar, and can only give a faint outline of
my future success in that honorable profession; but I trust, sir, like the
Eagle, I shall look down from the lofty rocks upon the dwellings of
man, and shall ever be ready to give you any assistance in my official
capacity, and whatever this muscular arm of mine can do, whenever it
shall be called from its buried greatness.” The Major grasped him by
the hand, and exclaimed: “O! thou exalted spirit of inspiration—thou
flame of burning prosperity, may the Heaven-directed blaze be the
glare of thy soul, and battle down every rampart that seems to impede
your progress!”

There is a strange sort of originality about McClintock; he imitates other
people's styles, but nobody can imitate his, not even an idiot. Other people
can be windy, but McClintock blows a gale; other people can blubber
sentiment, but McClintock spews it; other people can mishandle metaphors,
but only McClintock knows how to make a business of it. McClintock is
always McClintock, he is always consistent, his style is always his own
style. He does not make the mistake of being relevant on one page and
irrelevant on another; he is irrelevant on all of them. He does not make the
mistake of being lucid in one place and obscure in another; he is obscure all
the time. He does not make the mistake of slipping in a name here and there
that is out of character with his work; he always uses names that exactly
and fantastically fit his lunatics. In the matter of undeviating consistency he
stands alone in authorship. It is this that makes his style unique, and entitles
it to a name of its own—McClintockian. It is this that protects it from being
mistaken for anybody else's. Uncredited quotations from other writers often
leave a reader in doubt as to their authorship, but McClintock is safe from
that accident; an uncredited quotation from him would always be
recognizable. When a boy nineteen years old, who had just been admitted to
the bar, says, “I trust, sir, like the Eagle, I shall look down from lofty rocks
upon the dwellings of man,” we know who is speaking through that boy; we
should recognize that note anywhere. There be myriads of instruments in
this world's literary orchestra, and a multitudinous confusion of sounds that
they make, wherein fiddles are drowned, and guitars smothered, and one
sort of drum mistaken for another sort; but whensoever the brazen note of
the McClintockian trombone breaks through that fog of music, that note is
recognizable, and about it there can be no blur of doubt.

The novel now arrives at the point where the Major goes home to see his
father. When McClintock wrote this interview he probably believed it was
pathetic.
The road which led to the town presented many attractions Elfonzo
had bid farewell to the youth of deep feeling, and was now wending
his way to the dreaming spot of his fondness. The south winds
whistled through the woods, as the waters dashed against the banks, as
rapid fire in the pent furnace roars. This brought him to remember
while alone, that he quietly left behind the hospitality of a father's
house, and gladly entered the world, with higher hopes than are often
realized. But as he journeyed onward, he was mindful of the advice of
his father, who had often looked sadly on the ground, when tears of
cruelly deceived hope moistened his eyes. Elfonzo had been somewhat
a dutiful son; yet fond of the amusements of life—had been in distant
lands—had enjoyed the pleasure of the world, and had frequently
returned to the scenes of his boyhood, almost destitute of many of the
comforts of life. In this condition, he would frequently say to his
father, “Have I offended you, that you look upon me as a stranger, and
frown upon me with stinging looks? Will you not favor me with the
sound of your voice? If I have trampled upon your veneration, or have
spread a humid veil of darkness around your expectations, send me
back into the world, where no heart beats for me—where the foot of
man had never yet trod; but give me at least one kind word—allow me
to come into the presence sometimes of thy winter-worn locks.”
“Forbid it, Heaven, that I should be angry with thee,” answered the
father, “my son, and yet I send thee back to the children of the world—
to the cold charity of the combat, and to a land of victory. I read
another destiny in thy countenance—I learn thy inclinations from the
flame that has already kindled in my soul a strange sensation. It will
seek thee, my dear Elfonzo, it will find thee—thou canst not escape
that lighted torch, which shall blot out from the remembrance of men a
long train of prophecies which they have foretold against thee. I once
thought not so. Once, I was blind; but now the path of life is plain
before me, and my sight is clear; yet, Elfonzo, return to thy worldly
occupation—take again in thy hand that chord of sweet sounds—
struggle with the civilized world and with your own heart; fly swiftly
to the enchanted ground—let the night-OWL send forth its screams
from the stubborn oak—let the sea sport upon the beach, and the stars
sing together; but learn of these, Elfonzo, thy doom, and thy hiding-
place. Our most innocent as well as our most lawful desires must often
be denied us, that we may learn to sacrifice them to a Higher will.”
Remembering such admonitions with gratitude, Elfonzo was
immediately urged by the recollection of his father's family to keep
moving.

McClintock has a fine gift in the matter of surprises; but as a rule they are
not pleasant ones, they jar upon the feelings. His closing sentence in the last

quotation is of that sort. It brings one down out of the tinted clouds in too
sudden and collapsed a fashion. It incenses one against the author for a
moment. It makes the reader want to take him by his winter-worn locks, and
trample on his veneration, and deliver him over to the cold charity of
combat, and blot him out with his own lighted torch. But the feeling does
not last. The master takes again in his hand that concord of sweet sounds of
his, and one is reconciled, pacified.
His steps became quicker and quicker—he hastened through the
piny woods, dark as the forest was, and with joy he very soon reached
the little village of repose, in whose bosom rested the boldest chivalry.
His close attention to every important object—his modest questions
about whatever was new to him—his reverence for wise old age, and
his ardent desire to learn many of the fine arts, soon brought him into
respectable notice.
One mild winter day, as he walked along the streets toward the
Academy, which stood upon a small eminence, surrounded by native
growth—some venerable in its appearance, others young and
prosperous—all seemed inviting, and seemed to be the very place for
learning as well as for genius to spend its research beneath its
spreading shades. He entered its classic walls in the usual mode of
southern manners.

The artfulness of this man! None knows so well as he how to pique the
curiosity of the reader—and how to disappoint it. He raises the hope, here,
that he is going to tell all about how one enters a classic wall in the usual
mode of Southern manners; but does he? No; he smiles in his sleeve, and
turns aside to other matters.
The principal of the Institution begged him to be seated and listen to
the recitations that were going on. He accordingly obeyed the request,
and seemed to be much pleased. After the school was dismissed, and
the young hearts regained their freedom, with the songs of the evening,
laughing at the anticipated pleasures of a happy home, while others
tittered at the actions of the past day, he addressed the teacher in a tone
that indicated a resolution—with an undaunted mind. He said he had
determined to become a student, if he could meet with his approbation.
“Sir,” said he, “I have spent much time in the world. I have traveled
among the uncivilized inhabitants of America. I have met with friends,
and combated with foes; but none of these gratify my ambition, or
decide what is to be my destiny. I see the learned world have an
influence with the voice of the people themselves. The despoilers of
the remotest kingdoms of the earth refer their differences to this class
of persons. This the illiterate and inexperienced little dream of; and
now if you will receive me as I am, with these deficiencies—with all
my misguided opinions, I will give you my honor, sir, that I will never

disgrace the Institution, or those who have placed you in this
honorable station.” The instructor, who had met with many
disappointments, knew how to feel for a stranger who had been thus
turned upon the charities of an unfeeling community. He looked at him
earnestly, and said: “Be of good cheer—look forward, sir, to the high
destination you may attain. Remember, the more elevated the mark at
which you aim, the more sure, the more glorious, the more magnificent
the prize.” From wonder to wonder, his encouragement led the
impatient listener. A strange nature bloomed before him—giant
streams promised him success—gardens of hidden treasures opened to
his view. All this, so vividly described, seemed to gain a new witchery
from his glowing fancy.

It seems to me that this situation is new in romance. I feel sure it has not
been attempted before. Military celebrities have been disguised and set at
lowly occupations for dramatic effect, but I think McClintock is the first to
send one of them to school. Thus, in this book, you pass from wonder to
wonder, through gardens of hidden treasure, where giant streams bloom
before you, and behind you, and all around, and you feel as happy, and
groggy, and satisfied with your quart of mixed metaphor aboard as you
would if it had been mixed in a sample-room and delivered from a jug.
Now we come upon some more McClintockian surprises—a sweetheart
who is sprung upon us without any preparation, along with a name for her
which is even a little more of a surprise than she herself is.
In 1842 he entered the class, and made rapid progress in the English
and Latin departments. Indeed, he continued advancing with such
rapidity that he was like to become the first in his class, and made such
unexpected progress, and was so studious, that he had almost forgotten
the pictured saint of his affections. The fresh wreaths of the pine and
cypress had waited anxiously to drop once more the dews of Heaven
upon the heads of those who had so often poured forth the tender
emotions of their souls under its boughs. He was aware of the pleasure
that he had seen there. So one evening, as he was returning from his
reading, he concluded he would pay a visit to this enchanting spot.
Little did he think of witnessing a shadow of his former happiness,
though no doubt he wished it might be so. He continued sauntering by
the roadside, meditating on the past. The nearer he approached the
spot, the more anxious he became. At that moment a tall female figure
flitted across his path, with a bunch of roses in her hand; her
countenance showed uncommon vivacity, with a resolute spirit; her
ivory teeth already appeared as she smiled beautifully, promenading—
while her ringlets of hair dangled unconsciously around her snowy
neck. Nothing was wanting to complete her beauty. The tinge of the
rose was in full bloom upon her cheek; the charms of sensibility and

tenderness were always her associates. In Ambulinia's bosom dwelt a
noble soul—one that never faded—one that never was conquered.

Ambulinia! It can hardly be matched in fiction. The full name is
Ambulinia Valeer. Marriage will presently round it out and perfect it. Then
it will be Mrs. Ambulinia Valeer Elfonzo. It takes the chromo.
Her heart yielded to no feeling but the love of Elfonzo, on whom
she gazed with intense delight, and to whom she felt herself more
closely bound, because he sought the hand of no other. Elfonzo was
roused from his apparent reverie. His books no longer were his
inseparable companions—his thoughts arrayed themselves to
encourage him to the field of victory. He endeavored to speak to his
supposed Ambulinia, but his speech appeared not in words. No, his
effort was a stream of fire, that kindled his soul into a flame of
admiration, and carried his senses away captive. Ambulinia had
disappeared, to make him more mindful of his duty. As she walked
speedily away through the piny woods, she calmly echoed: “O!
Elfonzo, thou wilt now look from thy sunbeams. Thou shalt now walk
in a new path—perhaps thy way leads through darkness; but fear not,
the stars foretell happiness.”

To McClintock that jingling jumble of fine words meant something, no
doubt, or seemed to mean something; but it is useless for us to try to divine
what it was. Ambulinia comes—we don't know whence nor why; she
mysteriously intimates—we don't know what; and then she goes echoing
away—we don't know whither; and down comes the curtain. McClintock's
art is subtle; McClintock's art is deep.
Not many days afterward, as surrounded by fragrant flowers she sat
one evening at twilight, to enjoy the cool breeze that whispered notes
of melody along the distant groves, the little birds perched on every
side, as if to watch the movements of their new visitor. The bells were
tolling, when Elfonzo silently stole along by the wild wood flowers,
holding in his hand his favorite instrument of music—his eye
continually searching for Ambulinia, who hardly seemed to perceive
him, as she played carelessly with the songsters that hopped from
branch to branch. Nothing could be more striking than the difference
between the two. Nature seemed to have given the more tender soul to
Elfonzo, and the stronger and more courageous to Ambulinia. A deep
feeling spoke from the eyes of Elfonzo—such a feeling as can only be
expressed by those who are blessed as admirers, and by those who are
able to return the same with sincerity of heart. He was a few years
older than Ambulinia: she had turned a little into her seventeenth. He
had almost grown up in the Cherokee country, with the same equal
proportions as one of the natives. But little intimacy had existed
between them until the year forty-one—because the youth felt that the
character of such a lovely girl was too exalted to inspire any other

feeling than that of quiet reverence. But as lovers will not always be
insulted, at all times and under all circumstances, by the frowns and
cold looks of crabbed old age, which should continually reflect dignity
upon those around, and treat the unfortunate as well as the fortunate
with a graceful mien, he continued to use diligence and perseverance.
All this lighted a spark in his heart that changed his whole character,
and like the unyielding Deity that follows the storm to check its rage in
the forest, he resolves for the first time to shake off his embarrassment
and return where he had before only worshiped.

At last we begin to get the Major's measure. We are able to put this and
that casual fact together, and build the man up before our eyes, and look at
him. And after we have got him built, we find him worth the trouble. By the
above comparison between his age and Ambulinia's, we guess the war-worn
veteran to be twenty-two; and the other facts stand thus: he had grown up in
the Cherokee country with the same equal proportions as one of the natives
—how flowing and graceful the language, and yet how tantalizing as to
meaning!—he had been turned adrift by his father, to whom he had been
“somewhat of a dutiful son”; he wandered in distant lands; came back
frequently “to the scenes of his boyhood, almost destitute of many of the
comforts of life,” in order to get into the presence of his father's winter-
worn locks, and spread a humid veil of darkness around his expectations;
but he was always promptly sent back to the cold charity of the combat
again; he learned to play the fiddle, and made a name for himself in that
line; he had dwelt among the wild tribes; he had philosophized about the
despoilers of the kingdoms of the earth, and found out—the cunning
creature—that they refer their differences to the learned for settlement; he
had achieved a vast fame as a military chieftain, the Achilles of the Florida
campaigns, and then had got him a spelling-book and started to school; he
had fallen in love with Ambulinia Valeer while she was teething, but had
kept it to himself awhile, out of the reverential awe which he felt for the
child; but now at last, like the unyielding Deity who follows the storm to
check its rage in the forest, he resolves to shake off his embarrassment, and
to return where before he had only worshiped. The Major, indeed, has made
up his mind to rise up and shake his faculties together, and to see if he can't
do that thing himself. This is not clear. But no matter about that: there
stands the hero, compact and visible; and he is no mean structure,
considering that his creator had never created anything before, and hadn't
anything but rags and wind to build with this time. It seems to me that no
one can contemplate this odd creature, this quaint and curious blatherskite,

without admiring McClintock, or, at any rate, loving him and feeling
grateful to him; for McClintock made him, he gave him to us; without
McClintock we could not have had him, and would now be poor.
But we must come to the feast again. Here is a courtship scene, down
there in the romantic glades among the raccoons, alligators, and things, that
has merit, peculiar literary merit. See how Achilles woos. Dwell upon the
second sentence (particularly the close of it) and the beginning of the third.
Never mind the new personage, Leos, who is intruded upon us unheralded
and unexplained. That is McClintock's way; it is his habit; it is a part of his
genius; he cannot help it; he never interrupts the rush of his narrative to
make introductions.
It could not escape Ambulinia's penetrating eye that he sought an
interview with her, which she as anxiously avoided, and assumed a
more distant calmness than before, seemingly to destroy all hope. After
many efforts and struggles with his own person, with timid steps the
Major approached the damsel, with the same caution as he would have
done in a field of battle. “Lady Ambulinia,” said he, trembling, “I have
long desired a moment like this. I dare not let it escape. I fear the
consequences; yet I hope your indulgence will at least hear my
petition. Can you not anticipate what I would say, and what I am about
to express? Will not you, like Minerva, who sprung from the brain of
Jupiter, release me from thy winding chains or cure me—” “Say no
more, Elfonzo,” answered Ambulinia, with a serious look, raising her
hand as if she intended to swear eternal hatred against the whole
world; “another lady in my place would have perhaps answered your
question in bitter coldness. I know not the little arts of my sex. I care
but little for the vanity of those who would chide me, and am
unwilling as well as ashamed to be guilty of anything that would lead
you to think 'all is not gold that glitters'; so be not rash in your
resolution. It is better to repent now, than to do it in a more solemn
hour. Yes, I know what you would say. I know you have a costly gift
for me—the noblest that man can make—your heart! You should not
offer it to one so unworthy. Heaven, you know, has allowed my father's
house to be made a house of solitude, a home of silent obedience,
which my parents say is more to be admired than big names and high-
sounding titles. Notwithstanding all this, let me speak the emotions of
an honest heart—allow me to say in the fullness of my hopes that I
anticipate better days. The bird may stretch its wings toward the sun,
which it can never reach; and flowers of the field appear to ascend in
the same direction, because they cannot do otherwise; but man
confides his complaints to the saints in whom he believes; for in their
abodes of light they know no more sorrow. From your confession and
indicative looks, I must be that person; if so deceive not yourself.”

Elfonzo replied, “Pardon me, my dear madam, for my frankness. I
have loved you from my earliest days—everything grand and beautiful
hath borne the image of Ambulinia; while precipices on every hand
surrounded me, your guardian angel stood and beckoned me away
from the deep abyss. In every trial, in every misfortune, I have met
with your helping hand; yet I never dreamed or dared to cherish thy
love, till a voice impaired with age encouraged the cause, and declared
they who acquired thy favor should win a victory. I saw how Leos
worshiped thee. I felt my own unworthiness. I began to know
jealously, a strong guest—indeed, in my bosom,—yet I could see if I
gained your admiration Leos was to be my rival. I was aware that he
had the influence of your parents, and the wealth of a deceased
relative, which is too often mistaken for permanent and regular
tranquillity; yet I have determined by your permission to beg an
interest in your prayers—to ask you to animate my drooping spirits by
your smiles and your winning looks; for if you but speak I shall be
conqueror, my enemies shall stagger like Olympus shakes. And though
earth and sea may tremble, and the charioteer of the sun may forget his
dashing steed, yet I am assured that it is only to arm me with divine
weapons which will enable me to complete my long-tried intention.”

“Return to yourself, Elfonzo,” said Ambulinia, pleasantly: “a dream
of vision has disturbed your intellect; you are above the atmosphere,
dwelling in the celestial regions; nothing is there that urges or hinders,
nothing that brings discord into our present litigation. I entreat you to
condescend a little, and be a man, and forget it all. When Homer
describes the battle of the gods and noble men fighting with giants and
dragons, they represent under this image our struggles with the
delusions of our passions. You have exalted me, an unhappy girl, to the
skies; you have called me a saint, and portrayed in your imagination an
angel in human form. Let her remain such to you, let her continue to
be as you have supposed, and be assured that she will consider a share
in your esteem as her highest treasure. Think not that I would allure
you from the path in which your conscience leads you; for you know I
respect the conscience of others, as I would die for my own. Elfonzo,
if I am worthy of thy love, let such conversation never again pass
between us. Go, seek a nobler theme! we will seek it in the stream of
time, as the sun set in the Tigris.” As she spake these words she
grasped the hand of Elfonzo, saying at the same time—“Peace and
prosperity attend you, my hero; be up and doing!” Closing her remarks
with this expression, she walked slowly away, leaving Elfonzo
astonished and amazed. He ventured not to follow or detain her. Here
he stood alone, gazing at the stars; confounded as he was, here he
stood.

Yes; there he stood. There seems to be no doubt about that. Nearly half of
this delirious story has now been delivered to the reader. It seems a pity to
reduce the other half to a cold synopsis. Pity! it is more than a pity, it is a
crime; for to synopsize McClintock is to reduce a sky-flushing

conflagration to dull embers, it is to reduce barbaric splendor to ragged
poverty. McClintock never wrote a line that was not precious; he never
wrote one that could be spared; he never framed one from which a word
could be removed without damage. Every sentence that this master has
produced may be likened to a perfect set of teeth, white, uniform, beautiful.
If you pull one, the charm is gone.
Still, it is now necessary to begin to pull, and to keep it up; for lack of
space requires us to synopsize.
We left Elfonzo standing there amazed. At what, we do not know. Not at
the girl's speech. No; we ourselves should have been amazed at it, of
course, for none of us has ever heard anything resembling it; but Elfonzo
was used to speeches made up of noise and vacancy, and could listen to
them with undaunted mind like the “topmost topaz of an ancient tower”; he
was used to making them himself; he—but let it go, it cannot be guessed
out; we shall never know what it was that astonished him. He stood there
awhile; then he said, “Alas! am I now Grief's disappointed son at last?” He
did not stop to examine his mind, and to try to find out what he probably
meant by that, because, for one reason, “a mixture of ambition and
greatness of soul moved upon his young heart,” and started him for the
village. He resumed his bench in school, “and reasonably progressed in his
education.” His heart was heavy, but he went into society, and sought
surcease of sorrow in its light distractions. He made himself popular with
his violin, “which seemed to have a thousand chords—more symphonious
than the Muses of Apollo, and more enchanting than the ghost of the Hills.”
This is obscure, but let it go.
During this interval Leos did some unencouraged courting, but at last,
“choked by his undertaking,” he desisted.
Presently “Elfonzo again wends his way to the stately walls and new-
built village.” He goes to the house of his beloved; she opens the door
herself. To my surprise—for Ambulinia's heart had still seemed free at the
time of their last interview—love beamed from the girl's eyes. One sees that
Elfonzo was surprised, too; for when he caught that light, “a halloo of
smothered shouts ran through every vein.” A neat figure—a very neat
figure, indeed! Then he kissed her. “The scene was overwhelming.” They
went into the parlor. The girl said it was safe, for her parents were abed, and

would never know. Then we have this fine picture—flung upon the canvas
with hardly an effort, as you will notice.
Advancing toward him, she gave a bright display of her rosy neck,
and from her head the ambrosial locks breathed divine fragrance; her
robe hung waving to his view, while she stood like a goddess
confessed before him.

There is nothing of interest in the couple's interview. Now at this point
the girl invites Elfonzo to a village show, where jealousy is the motive of
the play, for she wants to teach him a wholesome lesson, if he is a jealous
person. But this is a sham, and pretty shallow. McClintock merely wants a
pretext to drag in a plagiarism of his upon a scene or two in “Othello.”
The lovers went to the play. Elfonzo was one of the fiddlers. He and
Ambulinia must not be seen together, lest trouble follow with the girl's
malignant father; we are made to understand that clearly. So the two sit
together in the orchestra, in the midst of the musicians. This does not seem
to be good art. In the first place, the girl would be in the way, for orchestras
are always packed closely together, and there is no room to spare for
people's girls; in the next place, one cannot conceal a girl in an orchestra
without everybody taking notice of it. There can be no doubt, it seems to
me, that this is bad art.
Leos is present. Of course, one of the first things that catches his eye is
the maddening spectacle of Ambulinia “leaning upon Elfonzo's chair.” This
poor girl does not seem to understand even the rudiments of concealment.
But she is “in her seventeenth,” as the author phrases it, and that is her
justification.
Leos meditates, constructs a plan—with personal violence as a basis, of
course. It was their way down there. It is a good plain plan, without any
imagination in it. He will go out and stand at the front door, and when these
two come out he will “arrest Ambulinia from the hands of the insolent
Elfonzo,” and thus make for himself a “more prosperous field of
immortality than ever was decreed by Omnipotence, or ever pencil drew or
artist imagined.” But, dear me, while he is waiting there the couple climb
out at the back window and scurry home! This is romantic enough, but there
is a lack of dignity in the situation.
At this point McClintock puts in the whole of his curious play—which
we skip.

Some correspondence follows now. The bitter father and the distressed
lovers write the letters. Elopements are attempted. They are idiotically
planned, and they fail. Then we have several pages of romantic powwow
and confusion signifying nothing. Another elopement is planned; it is to
take place on Sunday, when everybody is at church. But the “hero” cannot
keep the secret; he tells everybody. Another author would have found
another instrument when he decided to defeat this elopement; but that is not
McClintock's way. He uses the person that is nearest at hand.
The evasion failed, of course. Ambulinia, in her flight, takes refuge in a
neighbor's house. Her father drags her home. The villagers gather, attracted
by the racket.
Elfonzo was moved at this sight. The people followed on to see
what was going to become of Ambulinia, while he, with downcast
looks, kept at a distance, until he saw them enter the abode of the
father, thrusting her, that was the sigh of his soul, out of his presence
into a solitary apartment, when she exclaimed, “Elfonzo! Elfonzo! oh,
Elfonzo! where art thou, with all thy heroes? haste, oh! haste, come
thou to my relief. Ride on the wings of the wind! Turn thy force loose
like a tempest, and roll on thy army like a whirlwind, over this
mountain of trouble and confusion. Oh friends! if any pity me, let your
last efforts throng upon the green hills, and come to the relief of
Ambulinia, who is guilty of nothing but innocent love.” Elfonzo called
out with a loud voice, “My God, can I stand this! arouse up, I beseech
you, and put an end to this tyranny. Come, my brave boys,” said he,
“are you ready to go forth to your duty?” They stood around him.
“Who,” said he, “will call us to arms? Where are my thunderbolts of
war? Speak ye, the first who will meet the foe! Who will go forward
with me in this ocean of grievous temptation? If there is one who
desires to go, let him come and shake hands upon the altar of devotion,
and swear that he will be a hero; yes, a Hector in a cause like this,
which calls aloud for a speedy remedy.” “Mine be the deed,” said a
young lawyer, “and mine alone; Venus alone shall quit her station
before I will forsake one jot or tittle of my promise to you; what is
death to me? what is all this warlike army, if it is not to win a victory?
I love the sleep of the lover and the mighty; nor would I give it over
till the blood of my enemies should wreak with that of my own. But
God forbid that our fame should soar on the blood of the slumberer.”
Mr. Valeer stands at his door with the frown of a demon upon his brow,
with his dangerous weapon ready to strike the first man who should
enter his door. “Who will arise and go forward through blood and
carnage to the rescue of my Ambulinia?” said Elfonzo. “All,”
exclaimed the multitude; and onward they went, with their implements
of battle. Others, of a more timid nature, stood among the distant hills
to see the result of the contest.

It will hardly be believed that after all this thunder and lightning not a
drop of rain fell; but such is the fact. Elfonzo and his gang stood up and
black-guarded Mr. Valeer with vigor all night, getting their outlay back with
interest; then in the early morning the army and its general retired from the
field, leaving the victory with their solitary adversary and his crowbar. This
is the first time this has happened in romantic literature. The invention is
original. Everything in this book is original; there is nothing hackneyed
about it anywhere. Always, in other romances, when you find the author
leading up to a climax, you know what is going to happen. But in this book
it is different; the thing which seems inevitable and unavoidable never
happens; it is circumvented by the art of the author every time.
Another elopement was attempted. It failed.
We have now arrived at the end. But it is not exciting. McClintock thinks
it is; but it isn't. One day Elfonzo sent Ambulinia another note—a note
proposing elopement No. 16. This time the plan is admirable; admirable,
sagacious, ingenious, imaginative, deep—oh, everything, and perfectly
easy. One wonders why it was never thought of before. This is the scheme.
Ambulinia is to leave the breakfast-table, ostensibly to “attend to the
placing of those flowers, which should have been done a week ago”—
artificial ones, of course; the others wouldn't keep so long—and then,
instead of fixing the flowers, she is to walk out to the grove, and go off with
Elfonzo. The invention of this plan overstrained the author that is plain, for
he straightway shows failing powers. The details of the plan are not many
or elaborate. The author shall state them himself—this good soul, whose
intentions are always better than his English:
“You walk carelessly toward the academy grove, where you will
find me with a lightning steed, elegantly equipped to bear you off
where we shall be joined in wedlock with the first connubial rights.”

Last scene of all, which the author, now much enfeebled, tries to smarten
up and make acceptable to his spectacular heart by introducing some new
properties—silver bow, golden harp, olive branch—things that can all come
good in an elopement, no doubt, yet are not to be compared to an umbrella
for real handiness and reliability in an excursion of that kind.
And away she ran to the sacred grove, surrounded with glittering
pearls, that indicated her coming. Elfonzo hails her with his silver bow
and his golden harp. They meet—Ambulinia's countenance brightens
—Elfonzo leads up the winged steed. “Mount,” said he, “ye true-

hearted, ye fearless soul—the day is ours.” She sprang upon the back
of the young thunderbolt, a brilliant star sparkles upon her head, with
one hand she grasps the reins, and with the other she holds an olive
branch. “Lend thy aid, ye strong winds,” they exclaimed, “ye moon, ye
sun, and all ye fair host of heaven, witness the enemy conquered.”
“Hold,” said Elfonzo, “thy dashing steed.” “Ride on,” said Ambulinia,
“the voice of thunder is behind us.” And onward they went, with such
rapidity that they very soon arrived at Rural Retreat, where they
dismounted, and were united with all the solemnities that usually
attended such divine operations.

There is but one Homer, there is but one Shakespeare, there is but one
McClintock—and his immortal book is before you. Homer could not have
written this book, Shakespeare could not have written it, I could not have
done it myself. There is nothing just like it in the literature of any country or
of any epoch. It stands alone; it is monumental. It adds G. Ragsdale
McClintock's to the sum of the republic's imperishable names.
1. The name here given is a substitute for the one actually attached to the
pamphlet.
2. Further on it will be seen that he is a country expert on the fiddle, and
has a three-township fame.
3. It is a crowbar.

THE CURIOUS BOOK
COMPLETE

(The foregoing review of the great work of G. Ragsdale McClintock is
liberally illuminated with sample extracts, but these cannot appease the
appetite. Only the complete book, unabridged, can do that. Therefore it is
here printed.—M.T.)
THE ENEMY CONQUERED; OR, LOVE TRIUMPHANT

Sweet girl, thy smiles are full of charms,

Thy voice is sweeter still,

It fills the breast with fond alarms,

Echoed by every rill.

I begin this little work with an eulogy upon woman, who has ever been
distinguished for her perseverance, her constancy, and her devoted attention
to those upon whom she has been pleased to place her affections. Many
have been the themes upon which writers and public speakers have dwelt
with intense and increasing interest. Among these delightful themes stands
that of woman, the balm to all our sighs and disappointments, and the most
pre-eminent of all other topics. Here the poet and orator have stood and
gazed with wonder and with admiration; they have dwelt upon her
innocence, the ornament of all her virtues. First viewing her external
charms, such as set forth in her form and benevolent countenance, and then
passing to the deep hidden springs of loveliness and disinterested devotion.
In every clime, and in every age, she has been the pride of her nation. Her
watchfulness is untiring; she who guarded the sepulcher was the first to
approach it, and the last to depart from its awful yet sublime scene. Even
here, in this highly favored land, we look to her for the security of our
institutions, and for our future greatness as a nation. But, strange as it may
appear, woman's charms and virtues are but slightly appreciated by
thousands. Those who should raise the standard of female worth, and paint
her value with her virtues, in living colors, upon the banners that are fanned

by the zephyrs of heaven, and hand them down to posterity as emblematical
of a rich inheritance, do not properly estimate them.
Man is not sensible, at all times, of the nature and the emotions which
bear that name; he does not understand, he will not comprehend; his
intelligence has not expanded to that degree of glory which drinks in the
vast revolution of humanity, its end, its mighty destination, and the causes
which operated, and are still operating, to produce a more elevated station,
and the objects which energize and enliven its consummation. This he is a
stranger to; he is not aware that woman is the recipient of celestial love, and
that man is dependent upon her to perfect his character; that without her,
philosophically and truly speaking, the brightest of his intelligence is but
the coldness of a winter moon, whose beams can produce no fruit, whose
solar light is not its own, but borrowed from the great dispenser of effulgent
beauty. We have no disposition in the world to flatter the fair sex, we would
raise them above those dastardly principles which only exist in little souls,
contracted hearts, and a distracted brain. Often does she unfold herself in all
her fascinating loveliness, presenting the most captivating charms; yet we
find man frequently treats such purity of purpose with indifference. Why
does he do it? Why does he baffle that which is inevitably the source of his
better days? Is he so much of a stranger to those excellent qualities as not to
appreciate woman, as not to have respect to her dignity? Since her art and
beauty first captivated man, she has been his delight and his comfort; she
has shared alike in his misfortunes and in his prosperity.
Whenever the billows of adversity and the tumultuous waves of trouble
beat high, her smiles subdue their fury. Should the tear of sorrow and the
mournful sigh of grief interrupt the peace of his mind, her voice removes
them all, and she bends from her circle to encourage him onward. When
darkness would obscure his mind, and a thick cloud of gloom would
bewilder its operations, her intelligent eye darts a ray of streaming light into
his heart. Mighty and charming is that disinterested devotion which she is
ever ready to exercise toward man, not waiting till the last moment of his
danger, but seeks to relieve him in his early afflictions. It gushes forth from
the expansive fullness of a tender and devoted heart, where the noblest, the
purest, and the most elevated and refined feelings are matured and
developed in those many kind offices which invariably make her character.

In the room of sorrow and sickness, this unequaled characteristic may
always been seen, in the performance of the most charitable acts; nothing
that she can do to promote the happiness of him who she claims to be her
protector will be omitted; all is invigorated by the animating sunbeams
which awaken the heart to songs of gaiety. Leaving this point, to notice
another prominent consideration, which is generally one of great moment
and of vital importance. Invariably she is firm and steady in all her pursuits
and aims. There is required a combination of forces and extreme opposition
to drive her from her position; she takes her stand, not to be moved by the
sound of Apollo's lyre or the curved bow of pleasure.
Firm and true to what she undertakes, and that which she requires by her
own aggrandizement, and regards as being within the strict rules of
propriety, she will remain stable and unflinching to the last. A more genuine
principle is not to be found in the most determined, resolute heart of man.
For this she deserves to be held in the highest commendation, for this she
deserves the purest of all other blessings, and for this she deserves the most
laudable reward of all others. It is a noble characteristic and is worthy of
imitation of any age. And when we look at it in one particular aspect, it is
still magnified, and grows brighter and brighter the more we reflect upon its
eternal duration. What will she not do, when her word as well as her
affections and love are pledged to her lover? Everything that is dear to her
on earth, all the hospitalities of kind and loving parents, all the sincerity and
loveliness of sisters, and the benevolent devotion of brothers, who have
surrounded her with every comfort; she will forsake them all, quit the
harmony and sweet sound of the lute and the harp, and throw herself upon
the affections of some devoted admirer, in whom she fondly hopes to find
more than she has left behind, which is not often realized by many. Truth
and virtue all combined! How deserving our admiration and love! Ah cruel
would it be in man, after she has thus manifested such an unshaken
confidence in him, and said by her determination to abandon all the
endearments and blandishments of home, to act a villainous part, and prove
a traitor in the revolution of his mission, and then turn Hector over the
innocent victim whom he swore to protect, in the presence of Heaven,
recorded by the pen of an angel.
Striking as this trait may unfold itself in her character, and as pre-eminent
as it may stand among the fair display of her other qualities, yet there is
another, which struggles into existence, and adds an additional luster to

what she already possesses. I mean that disposition in woman which
enables her, in sorrow, in grief, and in distress, to bear all with enduring
patience. This she has done, and can and will do, amid the din of war and
clash of arms. Scenes and occurrences which, to every appearance, are
calculated to rend the heart with the profoundest emotions of trouble, do not
fetter that exalted principle imbued in her very nature. It is true, her tender
and feeling heart may often be moved (as she is thus constituted), but she is
not conquered, she has not given up to the harlequin of disappointments,
her energies have not become clouded in the last movement of misfortune,
but she is continually invigorated by the archetype of her affections. She
may bury her face in her hands, and let the tear of anguish roll, she may
promenade the delightful walks of some garden, decorated with all the
flowers of nature, or she may steal out along some gently rippling stream,
and there, as the silver waters uninterruptedly move forward, shed her silent
tears; they mingle with the waves, and take a last farewell of their agitated
home, to seek a peaceful dwelling among the rolling floods; yet there is a
voice rushing from her breast, that proclaims victory along the whole line
and battlement of her affections. That voice is the voice of patience and
resignation; that voice is one that bears everything calmly and
dispassionately, amid the most distressing scenes; when the fates are
arrayed against her peace, and apparently plotting for her destruction, still
she is resigned.
Woman's affections are deep, consequently her troubles may be made to
sink deep. Although you may not be able to mark the traces of her grief and
the furrowings of her anguish upon her winning countenance, yet be
assured they are nevertheless preying upon her inward person, sapping the
very foundation of that heart which alone was made for the weal and not the
woe of man. The deep recesses of the soul are fields for their operation. But
they are not destined simply to take the regions of the heart for their
dominion, they are not satisfied merely with interrupting her better feelings;
but after a while you may see the blooming cheek beginning to droop and
fade, her intelligent eye no longer sparkles with the starry light of heaven,
her vibrating pulse long since changed its regular motion, and her
palpitating bosom beats once more for the midday of her glory. Anxiety and
care ultimately throw her into the arms of the haggard and grim monster
death. But, oh, how patient, under every pining influence! Let us view the
matter in bolder colors; see her when the dearest object of her affections

recklessly seeks every bacchanalian pleasure, contents himself with the last
rubbish of creation. With what solicitude she awaits his return! Sleep fails
to perform its office—she weeps while the nocturnal shades of the night
triumph in the stillness. Bending over some favorite book, whilst the author
throws before her mind the most beautiful imagery, she startles at every
sound. The midnight silence is broken by the solemn announcement of the
return of another morning. He is still absent; she listens for that voice which
has so often been greeted by the melodies of her own; but, alas! stern
silence is all that she receives for her vigilance.
Mark her unwearied watchfulness, as the night passes away. At last,
brutalized by the accursed thing, he staggers along with rage, and, shivering
with cold, he makes his appearance. Not a murmur is heard from her lips.
On the contrary, she meets him with a smile—she caresses him with tender
arms, with all the gentleness and softness of her sex. Here, then, is seen her
disposition, beautifully arrayed. Woman, thou art more to be admired than
the spicy gales of Arabia, and more sought for than the gold of Golconda.
We believe that Woman should associate freely with man, and we believe
that it is for the preservation of her rights. She should become acquainted
with the metaphysical designs of those who condescended to sing the siren
song of flattery. This, we think, should be according to the unwritten law of
decorum, which is stamped upon every innocent heart. The precepts of
prudery are often steeped in the guilt of contamination, which blasts the
expectations of better moments. Truth, and beautiful dreams—loveliness,
and delicacy of character, with cherished affections of the ideal woman—
gentle hopes and aspirations, are enough to uphold her in the storms of
darkness, without the transferred colorings of a stained sufferer. How often
have we seen it in our public prints, that woman occupies a false station in
the world! and some have gone so far as to say it was an unnatural one. So
long has she been regarded a weak creature, by the rabble and illiterate—
they have looked upon her as an insufficient actress on the great stage of
human life—a mere puppet, to fill up the drama of human existence—a
thoughtless, inactive being—that she has too often come to the same
conclusion herself, and has sometimes forgotten her high destination, in the
meridian of her glory. We have but little sympathy or patience for those
who treat her as a mere Rosy Melindi—who are always fishing for pretty
complements—who are satisfied by the gossamer of Romance, and who can
be allured by the verbosity of high-flown words, rich in language, but poor

and barren in sentiment. Beset, as she has been, by the intellectual vulgar,
the selfish, the designing, the cunning, the hidden, and the artful—no
wonder she has sometimes folded her wings in despair, and forgotten her
heavenly mission in the delirium of imagination; no wonder she searches
out some wild desert, to find a peaceful home. But this cannot always
continue. A new era is moving gently onward, old things are rapidly passing
away; old superstitions, old prejudices, and old notions are now bidding
farewell to their old associates and companions, and giving way to one
whose wings are plumed with the light of heaven and tinged by the dews of
the morning. There is a remnant of blessedness that clings to her in spite of
all evil influence, there is enough of the Divine Master left to accomplish
the noblest work ever achieved under the canopy of the vaulted skies; and
that time is fast approaching, when the picture of the true woman will shine
from its frame of glory, to captivate, to win back, to restore, and to call into
being once more, the object of her mission.

Star of the brave! thy glory shed,
O'er all the earth, thy army led—
Bold meteor of immortal birth!
Why come from Heaven to dwell on Earth?

Mighty and glorious are the days of youth; happy the moments of the
lover, mingled with smiles and tears of his devoted, and long to be
remembered are the achievements which he gains with a palpitating heart
and a trembling hand. A bright and lovely dawn, the harbinger of a fair and
prosperous day, had arisen over the beautiful little village of Cumming,
which is surrounded by the most romantic scenery in the Cherokee country.
Brightening clouds seemed to rise from the mist of the fair Chattahoochee,
to spread their beauty over the thick forest, to guide the hero whose bosom
beats with aspirations to conquer the enemy that would tarnish his name,
and to win back the admiration of his long-tried friend. He endeavored to
make his way through Sawney's Mountain, where many meet to catch the
gales that are continually blowing for the refreshment of the stranger and
the traveler. Surrounded as he was by hills on every side, naked rocks dared
the efforts of his energies. Soon the sky became overcast, the sun buried
itself in the clouds, and the fair day gave place to gloomy twilight, which
lay heavily on the Indian Plains. He remembered an old Indian Castle, that
once stood at the foot of the mountain. He thought if he could make his way
to this, he would rest contented for a short time. The mountain air breathed

fragrance—a rosy tinge rested on the glassy waters that murmured at its
base. His resolution soon brought him to the remains of the red man's hut:
he surveyed with wonder and astonishment the decayed building, which
time had buried in the dust, and thought to himself, his happiness was not
yet complete. Beside the shore of the brook sat a young man, about eighteen
or twenty, who seemed to be reading some favorite book, and who had a
remarkably noble countenance—eyes which betrayed more than a common
mind. This of course made the youth a welcome guest, and gained him
friends in whatever condition of life he might be placed. The traveler
observed that he was a well-built figure, which showed strength and grace
in every movement. He accordingly addressed him in quite a gentlemanly
manner, and inquired of him the way to the village. After he had received
the desired information, and was about taking his leave, the youth said,
“Are you not Major Elfonzo, the great musician—the champion of a noble
cause—the modern Achilles, who gained so many victories in the Florida
War?” “I bear that name,” said the Major, “and those titles, trusting at the
same time that the ministers of grace will carry me triumphantly through all
my laudable undertakings, and if,” continued the Major, “you, sir, are the
patronizer of noble deeds, I should like to make you my confidant and learn
your address.” The youth looked somewhat amazed, bowed low, mused for
a moment, and began: “My name is Roswell. I have been recently admitted
to the bar, and can only give a faint outline of my future success in that
honorable profession; but I trust, sir, like the Eagle, I shall look down from
lofty rocks upon the dwellings of man, and shall ever be ready to give you
any assistance in my official capacity, and whatever this muscular arm of
mine can do, whenever it shall be called from its buried greatness.” The
Major grasped him by the hand, and exclaimed: “O! thou exalted spirit of
inspiration—thou flame of burning prosperity, may the Heaven-directed
blaze be the glare of thy soul, and battle down every rampart that seems to
impede your progress!”
The road which led to the town presented many attractions. Elfonzo had
bid farewell to the youth of deep feeling, and was now wending his way to
the dreaming spot of his fondness. The south winds whistled through the
woods, as the waters dashed against the banks, as rapid fire in the pent
furnace roars. This brought him to remember while alone, that he quietly
left behind the hospitality of a father's house, and gladly entered the world,
with higher hopes than are often realized. But as he journeyed onward, he

was mindful of the advice of his father, who had often looked sadly on the
ground when tears of cruelly deceived hope moistened his eye. Elfonzo had
been somewhat of a dutiful son; yet fond of the amusements of life—had
been in distant lands—had enjoyed the pleasure of the world and had
frequently returned to the scenes of his boyhood, almost destitute of many
of the comforts of life. In this condition, he would frequently say to his
father, “Have I offended you, that you look upon me as a stranger, and
frown upon me with stinging looks? Will you not favor me with the sound
of your voice? If I have trampled upon your veneration, or have spread a
humid veil of darkness around your expectations, send me back into the
world where no heart beats for me—where the foot of man has never yet
trod; but give me at least one kind word—allow me to come into the
presence sometimes of thy winter-worn locks.” “Forbid it, Heaven, that I
should be angry with thee,” answered the father, “my son, and yet I send
thee back to the children of the world—to the cold charity of the combat,
and to a land of victory. I read another destiny in thy countenance—I learn
thy inclinations from the flame that has already kindled in my soul a strange
sensation. It will seek thee, my dear Elfonzo, it will find thee—thou canst
not escape that lighted torch, which shall blot out from the remembrance of
men a long train of prophecies which they have foretold against thee. I once
thought not so. Once, I was blind; but now the path of life is plain before
me, and my sight is clear; yet Elfonzo, return to thy worldly occupation—
take again in thy hand that chord of sweet sounds—struggle with the
civilized world, and with your own heart; fly swiftly to the enchanted
ground—let the night-_owl_ send forth its screams from the stubborn oak—
let the sea sport upon the beach, and the stars sing together; but learn of
these, Elfonzo, thy doom, and thy hiding-place. Our most innocent as well
as our most lawful desires must often be denied us, that we may learn to
sacrifice them to a Higher will.”
Remembering such admonitions with gratitude, Elfonzo was immediately
urged by the recollection of his father's family to keep moving. His steps
became quicker and quicker—he hastened through the piny woods, dark as
the forest was, and with joy he very soon reached the little village of repose,
in whose bosom rested the boldest chivalry. His close attention to every
important object—his modest questions about whatever was new to him—
his reverence for wise old age, and his ardent desire to learn many of the
fine arts, soon brought him into respectable notice.

One mild winter day as he walked along the streets toward the Academy,
which stood upon a small eminence, surrounded by native growth—some
venerable in its appearance, others young and prosperous—all seemed
inviting, and seemed to be the very place for learning as well as for genius
to spend its research beneath its spreading shades. He entered its classic
walls in the usual mode of southern manners. The principal of the
Institution begged him to be seated and listen to the recitations that were
going on. He accordingly obeyed the request, and seemed to be much
pleased. After the school was dismissed, and the young hearts regained their
freedom, with the songs of the evening, laughing at the anticipated
pleasures of a happy home, while others tittered at the actions of the past
day, he addressed the teacher in a tone that indicated a resolution—with an
undaunted mind. He said he had determined to become a student, if he
could meet with his approbation. “Sir,” said he, “I have spent much time in
the world. I have traveled among the uncivilized inhabitants of America. I
have met with friends, and combated with foes; but none of these gratify
my ambition, or decide what is to be my destiny. I see the learned would
have an influence with the voice of the people themselves. The despoilers
of the remotest kingdoms of the earth refer their differences to this class of
persons. This the illiterate and inexperienced little dream of; and now if you
will receive me as I am, with these deficiencies—with all my misguided
opinions, I will give you my honor, sir, that I will never disgrace the
Institution, or those who have placed you in this honorable station.” The
instructor, who had met with many disappointments, knew how to feel for a
stranger who had been thus turned upon the charities of an unfeeling
community. He looked at him earnestly, and said: “Be of good cheer—look
forward, sir, to the high destination you may attain. Remember, the more
elevated the mark at which you aim, the more sure, the more glorious, the
more magnificent the prize.” From wonder to wonder, his encouragement
led the impatient listener. A strange nature bloomed before him—giant
streams promised him success—gardens of hidden treasures opened to his
view. All this, so vividly described, seemed to gain a new witchery from his
glowing fancy.
In 1842 he entered the class, and made rapid progress in the English and
Latin departments. Indeed, he continued advancing with such rapidity that
he was like to become the first in his class, and made such unexpected
progress, and was so studious, that he had almost forgotten the pictured

saint of his affections. The fresh wreaths of the pine and cypress had waited
anxiously to drop once more the dews of Heavens upon the heads of those
who had so often poured forth the tender emotions of their souls under its
boughs. He was aware of the pleasure that he had seen there. So one
evening, as he was returning from his reading, he concluded he would pay a
visit to this enchanting spot. Little did he think of witnessing a shadow of
his former happiness, though no doubt he wished it might be so. He
continued sauntering by the roadside, meditating on the past. The nearer he
approached the spot, the more anxious he became. At the moment a tall
female figure flitted across his path, with a bunch of roses in her hand; her
countenance showed uncommon vivacity, with a resolute spirit; her ivory
teeth already appeared as she smiled beautifully, promenading—while her
ringlets of hair dangled unconsciously around her snowy neck. Nothing was
wanting to complete her beauty. The tinge of the rose was in full bloom
upon her cheek; the charms of sensibility and tenderness were always her
associates.. In Ambulinia's bosom dwelt a noble soul—one that never faded
—one that never was conquered. Her heart yielded to no feeling but the
love of Elfonzo, on whom she gazed with intense delight, and to whom she
felt herself more closely bound, because he sought the hand of no other.
Elfonzo was roused from his apparent reverie. His books no longer were his
inseparable companions—his thoughts arrayed themselves to encourage
him in the field of victory. He endeavored to speak to his supposed
Ambulinia, but his speech appeared not in words. No, his effort was a
stream of fire, that kindled his soul into a flame of admiration, and carried
his senses away captive. Ambulinia had disappeared, to make him more
mindful of his duty. As she walked speedily away through the piny woods
she calmly echoed: “O! Elfonzo, thou wilt now look from thy sunbeams.
Thou shalt now walk in a new path—perhaps thy way leads through
darkness; but fear not, the stars foretell happiness.”
Not many days afterward, as surrounded by fragrant flowers she sat one
evening at twilight, to enjoy the cool breeze that whispered notes of melody
along the distant groves, the little birds perched on every side, as if to watch
the movements of their new visitor. The bells were tolling when Elfonzo
silently stole along by the wild wood flowers, holding in his hand his
favorite instrument of music—his eye continually searching for Ambulinia,
who hardly seemed to perceive him, as she played carelessly with the
songsters that hopped from branch to branch. Nothing could be more

striking than the difference between the two. Nature seemed to have given
the more tender soul to Elfonzo, and the stronger and more courageous to
Ambulinia. A deep feeling spoke from the eyes of Elfonzo—such a feeling
as can only be expressed by those who are blessed as admirers, and by those
who are able to return the same with sincerity of heart. He was a few years
older than Ambulinia: she had turned a little into her seventeenth. He had
almost grown up in the Cherokee country, with the same equal proportions
as one of the natives. But little intimacy had existed between them until the
year forty-one—because the youth felt that the character of such a lovely
girl was too exalted to inspire any other feeling than that of quiet reverence.
But as lovers will not always be insulted, at all times and under all
circumstances, by the frowns and cold looks of crabbed old age, which
should continually reflect dignity upon those around, and treat unfortunate
as well as the fortunate with a graceful mien, he continued to use diligence
and perseverance. All this lighted a spark in his heart that changed his
whole character, and like the unyielding Deity that follows the storm to
check its rage in the forest, he resolves for the first time to shake off his
embarrassment and return where he had before only worshiped.
It could not escape Ambulinia's penetrating eye that he sought an
interview with her, which she as anxiously avoided, and assumed a more
distant calmness than before, seemingly to destroy all hope. After many
efforts and struggles with his own person, with timid steps the Major
approached the damsel, with the same caution as he would have done in a
field of battle. “Lady Ambulinia,” said he, trembling, “I have long desired a
moment like this. I dare not let it escape. I fear the consequences; yet I hope
your indulgence will at least hear my petition. Can you not anticipate what I
would say, and what I am about to express? Will not you, like Minerva, who
sprung from the brain of Jupiter, release me from thy winding chains or
cure me—” “Say no more, Elfonzo,” answered Ambulinia, with a serious
look, raising her hand as if she intended to swear eternal hatred against the
whole world; “another lady in my place would have perhaps answered your
question in bitter coldness. I know not the little arts of my sex. I care but
little for the vanity of those who would chide me, and am unwilling as well
as shamed to be guilty of anything that would lead you to think 'all is not
gold that glitters'; so be not rash in your resolution. It is better to repent now
than to do it in a more solemn hour. Yes, I know what you would say. I
know you have a costly gift for me—the noblest that man can make—your

heart! you should not offer it to one so unworthy. Heaven, you know, has
allowed my father's house to be made a house of solitude, a home of silent
obedience, which my parents say is more to be admired than big names and
high-sounding titles. Notwithstanding all this, let me speak the emotions of
an honest heart; allow me to say in the fullness of my hopes that I anticipate
better days. The bird may stretch its wings toward the sun, which it can
never reach; and flowers of the field appear to ascend in the same direction,
because they cannot do otherwise; but man confides his complaints to the
saints in whom he believes; for in their abodes of light they know no more
sorrow. From your confession and indicative looks, I must be that person; if
so, deceive not yourself.”
Elfonzo replied, “Pardon me, my dear madam, for my frankness. I have
loved you from my earliest days; everything grand and beautiful hath borne
the image of Ambulinia; while precipices on every hand surrounded me,
your guardian angel stood and beckoned me away from the deep abyss. In
every trial, in every misfortune, I have met with your helping hand; yet I
never dreamed or dared to cherish thy love till a voice impaired with age
encouraged the cause, and declared they who acquired thy favor should win
a victory. I saw how Leos worshipped thee. I felt my own unworthiness. I
began to know jealousy—a strong guest, indeed, in my bosom—yet I could
see if I gained your admiration Leos was to be my rival. I was aware that he
had the influence of your parents, and the wealth of a deceased relative,
which is too often mistaken for permanent and regular tranquillity; yet I
have determined by your permission to beg an interest in your prayers—to
ask you to animate my drooping spirits by your smiles and your winning
looks; for if you but speak I shall be conqueror, my enemies shall stagger
like Olympus shakes. And though earth and sea may tremble, and the
charioteer of the sun may forget his dashing steed, yet I am assured that it is
only to arm me with divine weapons which will enable me to complete my
long-tried intention.”
“Return to your self, Elfonzo,” said Ambulinia, pleasantly; “a dream of
vision has disturbed your intellect; you are above the atmosphere, dwelling
in the celestial regions; nothing is there that urges or hinders, nothing that
brings discord into our present litigation. I entreat you to condescend a
little, and be a man, and forget it all. When Homer describes the battle of
the gods and noble men fighting with giants and dragons, they represent
under this image our struggles with the delusions of our passions. You have

exalted me, an unhappy girl, to the skies; you have called me a saint, and
portrayed in your imagination an angel in human form. Let her remain such
to you, let her continue to be as you have supposed, and be assured that she
will consider a share in your esteem as her highest treasure. Think not that I
would allure you from the path in which your conscience leads you; for you
know I respect the conscience of others, as I would die for my own.
Elfonzo, if I am worthy of thy love, let such conversation never again pass
between us. Go, seek a nobler theme! we will seek it in the stream of time
as the sun set in the Tigris.” As she spake these words she grasped the hand
of Elfonzo, saying at the same time, “Peace and prosperity attend you, my
hero: be up and doing!” Closing her remarks with this expression, she
walked slowly away, leaving Elfonzo astonished and amazed. He ventured
not to follow or detain her. Here he stood alone, gazing at the stars;
confounded as he was, here he stood. The rippling stream rolled on at his
feet. Twilight had already begun to draw her sable mantle over the earth,
and now and then the fiery smoke would ascend from the little town which
lay spread out before him. The citizens seemed to be full of life and good-
humor; but poor Elfonzo saw not a brilliant scene. No; his future life stood
before him, stripped of the hopes that once adorned all his sanguine desires.
“Alas!” said he, “am I now Grief's disappointed son at last.” Ambulinia's
image rose before his fancy. A mixture of ambition and greatness of soul
moved upon his young heart, and encouraged him to bear all his crosses
with the patience of a Job, notwithstanding he had to encounter with so
many obstacles. He still endeavored to prosecute his studies, and reasonably
progressed in his education. Still, he was not content; there was something
yet to be done before his happiness was complete. He would visit his
friends and acquaintances. They would invite him to social parties, insisting
that he should partake of the amusements that were going on. This he
enjoyed tolerably well. The ladies and gentlemen were generally well
pleased with the Major; as he delighted all with his violin, which seemed to
have a thousand chords—more symphonious than the Muses of Apollo and
more enchanting than the ghost of the Hills. He passed some days in the
country. During that time Leos had made many calls upon Ambulinia, who
was generally received with a great deal of courtesy by the family. They
thought him to be a young man worthy of attention, though he had but little
in his soul to attract the attention or even win the affections of her whose
graceful manners had almost made him a slave to every bewitching look

that fell from her eyes. Leos made several attempts to tell her of his fair
prospects—how much he loved her, and how much it would add to his bliss
if he could but think she would be willing to share these blessings with him;
but, choked by his undertaking, he made himself more like an inactive
drone than he did like one who bowed at beauty's shrine.
Elfonzo again wends his way to the stately walls and new-built village.
He now determines to see the end of the prophesy which had been foretold
to him. The clouds burst from his sight; he believes if he can but see his
Ambulinia, he can open to her view the bloody altars that have been
misrepresented to stigmatize his name. He knows that her breast is
transfixed with the sword of reason, and ready at all times to detect the
hidden villainy of her enemies. He resolves to see her in her own home,
with the consoling theme: “'I can but perish if I go.' Let the consequences
be what they may,” said he, “if I die, it shall be contending and struggling
for my own rights.”
Night had almost overtaken him when he arrived in town. Colonel Elder,
a noble-hearted, high-minded, and independent man, met him at his door as
usual, and seized him by the hand. “Well, Elfonzo,” said the Colonel, “how
does the world use you in your efforts?” “I have no objection to the world,”
said Elfonzo, “but the people are rather singular in some of their opinions.”
“Aye, well,” said the Colonel, “you must remember that creation is made up
of many mysteries; just take things by the right handle; be always sure you
know which is the smooth side before you attempt your polish; be
reconciled to your fate, be it what it may; and never find fault with your
condition, unless your complaining will benefit it. Perseverance is a
principle that should be commendable in those who have judgment to
govern it. I should never have been so successful in my hunting excursions
had I waited till the deer, by some magic dream, had been drawn to the
muzzle of the gun before I made an attempt to fire at the game that dared
my boldness in the wild forest. The great mystery in hunting seems to be—a
good marksman, a resolute mind, a fixed determination, and my word for it,
you will never return home without sounding your horn with the breath of a
new victory. And so with every other undertaking. Be confident that your
ammunition is of the right kind—always pull your trigger with a steady
hand, and so soon as you perceive a calm, touch her off, and the spoils are
yours.”

This filled him with redoubled vigor, and he set out with a stronger
anxiety than ever to the home of Ambulinia. A few short steps soon brought
him to the door, half out of breath. He rapped gently. Ambulinia, who sat in
the parlor alone, suspecting Elfonzo was near, ventured to the door, opened
it, and beheld the hero, who stood in an humble attitude, bowed gracefully,
and as they caught each other's looks the light of peace beamed from the
eyes of Ambulinia. Elfonzo caught the expression; a halloo of smothered
shouts ran through every vein, and for the first time he dared to impress a
kiss upon her cheek. The scene was overwhelming; had the temptation been
less animating, he would not have ventured to have acted so contrary to the
desired wish of his Ambulinia; but who could have withstood the
irrestistable temptation! What society condemns the practice but a cold,
heartless, uncivilized people that know nothing of the warm attachments of
refined society? Here the dead was raised to his long-cherished hopes, and
the lost was found. Here all doubt and danger were buried in the vortex of
oblivion; sectional differences no longer disunited their opinions; like the
freed bird from the cage, sportive claps its rustling wings, wheels about to
heaven in a joyful strain, and raises its notes to the upper sky. Ambulinia
insisted upon Elfonzo to be seated, and give her a history of his unnecessary
absence; assuring him the family had retired, consequently they would ever
remain ignorant of his visit. Advancing toward him, she gave a bright
display of her rosy neck, and from her head the ambrosial locks breathed
divine fragrance; her robe hung waving to his view, while she stood like a
goddess confessed before him.
“It does seem to me, my dear sir,” said Ambulinia, “that you have been
gone an age. Oh, the restless hours I have spent since I last saw you, in yon
beautiful grove. There is where I trifled with your feelings for the express
purpose of trying your attachment for me. I now find you are devoted; but
ah! I trust you live not unguarded by the powers of Heaven. Though oft did
I refuse to join my hand with thine, and as oft did I cruelly mock thy
entreaties with borrowed shapes: yes, I feared to answer thee by terms, in
words sincere and undissembled. O! could I pursue, and you have leisure to
hear the annals of my woes, the evening star would shut Heaven's gates
upon the impending day before my tale would be finished, and this night
would find me soliciting your forgiveness.”
“Dismiss thy fears and thy doubts,” replied Elfonzo.

“Look, O! look: that angelic look of thine—bathe not thy visage in tears;
banish those floods that are gathering; let my confession and my presence
bring thee some relief.” “Then, indeed, I will be cheerful,” said Ambulinia,
“and I think if we will go to the exhibition this evening, we certainly will
see something worthy of our attention. One of the most tragical scenes is to
be acted that has ever been witnessed, and one that every jealous-hearted
person should learn a lesson from. It cannot fail to have a good effect, as it
will be performed by those who are young and vigorous, and learned as
well as enticing. You are aware, Major Elfonzo, who are to appear on the
stage, and what the characters are to represent.” “I am acquainted with the
circumstances,” replied Elfonzo, “and as I am to be one of the musicians
upon that interesting occasion, I should be much gratified if you would
favor me with your company during the hours of the exercises.”
“What strange notions are in your mind?” inquired Ambulinia. “Now I
know you have something in view, and I desire you to tell me why it is that
you are so anxious that I should continue with you while the exercises are
going on; though if you think I can add to your happiness and predilections,
I have no particular objection to acquiesce in your request. Oh, I think I
foresee, now, what you anticipate.” “And will you have the goodness to tell
me what you think it will be?” inquired Elfonzo. “By all means,” answered
Ambulinia; “a rival, sir, you would fancy in your own mind; but let me say
for you, fear not! fear not! I will be one of the last persons to disgrace my
sex by thus encouraging every one who may feel disposed to visit me, who
may honor me with their graceful bows and their choicest compliments. It is
true that young men too often mistake civil politeness for the finer emotions
of the heart, which is tantamount to courtship; but, ah! how often are they
deceived, when they come to test the weight of sunbeams with those on
whose strength hangs the future happiness of an untried life.”
The people were now rushing to the Academy with impatient anxiety; the
band of music was closely followed by the students; then the parents and
guardians; nothing interrupted the glow of spirits which ran through every
bosom, tinged with the songs of a Virgil and the tide of a Homer. Elfonzo
and Ambulinia soon repaired to the scene, and fortunately for them both the
house was so crowded that they took their seats together in the music
department, which was not in view of the auditory. This fortuitous
circumstances added more the bliss of the Major than a thousand such
exhibitions would have done. He forgot that he was man; music had lost its

charms for him; whenever he attempted to carry his part, the string of the
instrument would break, the bow became stubborn, and refused to obey the
loud calls of the audience. Here, he said, was the paradise of his home, the
long-sought-for opportunity; he felt as though he could send a million
supplications to the throne of Heaven for such an exalted privilege. Poor
Leos, who was somewhere in the crowd, looking as attentively as if he was
searching for a needle in a haystack; here he stood, wondering to himself
why Ambulinia was not there. “Where can she be? Oh! if she was only
here, how I could relish the scene! Elfonzo is certainly not in town; but
what if he is? I have got the wealth, if I have not the dignity, and I am sure
that the squire and his lady have always been particular friends of mine, and
I think with this assurance I shall be able to get upon the blind side of the
rest of the family and make the heaven-born Ambulinia the mistress of all I
possess.” Then, again, he would drop his head, as if attempting to solve the
most difficult problem in Euclid. While he was thus conjecturing in his own
mind, a very interesting part of the exhibition was going on, which called
the attention of all present. The curtains of the stage waved continually by
the repelled forces that were given to them, which caused Leos to behold
Ambulinia leaning upon the chair of Elfonzo. Her lofty beauty, seen by the
glimmering of the chandelier, filled his heart with rapture, he knew not how
to contain himself; to go where they were would expose him to ridicule; to
continue where he was, with such an object before him, without being
allowed an explanation in that trying hour, would be to the great injury of
his mental as well as of his physical powers; and, in the name of high
heaven, what must he do? Finally, he resolved to contain himself as well as
he conveniently could, until the scene was over, and then he would plant
himself at the door, to arrest Ambulinia from the hands of the insolent
Elfonzo, and thus make for himself a more prosperous field of immortality
than ever was decreed by Omnipotence, or ever pencil drew or artist
imagined. Accordingly he made himself sentinel, immediately after the
performance of the evening—retained his position apparently in defiance of
all the world; he waited, he gazed at every lady, his whole frame trembled;
here he stood, until everything like human shape had disappeared from the
institution, and he had done nothing; he had failed to accomplish that which
he so eagerly sought for. Poor, unfortunate creature! he had not the eyes of
an Argus, or he might have seen his Juno and Elfonzo, assisted by his friend
Sigma, make their escape from the window, and, with the rapidity of a race-

horse, hurry through the blast of the storm to the residence of her father,
without being recognized. He did not tarry long, but assured Ambulinia the
endless chain of their existence was more closely connected than ever, since
he had seen the virtuous, innocent, imploring, and the constant Amelia
murdered by the jealous-hearted Farcillo, the accursed of the land.
The following is the tragical scene, which is only introduced to show the
subject-matter that enabled Elfonzo to come to such a determinate
resolution that nothing of the kind should ever dispossess him of his true
character, should he be so fortunate as to succeed in his present
undertaking.
Amelia was the wife of Farcillo, and a virtuous woman; Gracia, a young
lady, was her particular friend and confidant. Farcillo grew jealous of
Amelia, murders her, finds out that he was deceived, and stabs himself.
Amelia appears alone, talking to herself.
A. Hail, ye solitary ruins of antiquity, ye sacred tombs and silent walks! it
is your aid I invoke; it is to you, my soul, wrapt in deep mediation, pours
forth its prayer. Here I wander upon the stage of mortality, since the world
hath turned against me. Those whom I believed to be my friends, alas! are
now my enemies, planting thorns in all my paths, poisoning all my
pleasures, and turning the past to pain. What a lingering catalogue of sighs
and tears lies just before me, crowding my aching bosom with the fleeting
dream of humanity, which must shortly terminate. And to what purpose will
all this bustle of life, these agitations and emotions of the heart have
conduced, if it leave behind it nothing of utility, if it leave no traces of
improvement? Can it be that I am deceived in my conclusions? No, I see
that I have nothing to hope for, but everything to fear, which tends to drive
me from the walks of time.

Oh! in this dead night, if loud winds arise,

To lash the surge and bluster in the skies,

May the west its furious rage display,

Toss me with storms in the watery way.

(Enter Gracia.)
G. Oh, Amelia, is it you, the object of grief, the daughter of opulence, of
wisdom and philosophy, that thus complaineth? It cannot be you are the

child of misfortune, speaking of the monuments of former ages, which were
allotted not for the reflection of the distressed, but for the fearless and bold.
A. Not the child of poverty, Gracia, or the heir of glory and peace, but of
fate. Remember, I have wealth more than wit can number; I have had power
more than kings could emcompass; yet the world seems a desert; all nature
appears an afflictive spectacle of warring passions. This blind fatality, that
capriciously sports with the rules and lives of mortals, tells me that the
mountains will never again send forth the water of their springs to my thirst.
Oh, that I might be freed and set at liberty from wretchedness! But I fear, I
fear this will never be.
G. Why, Amelia, this untimely grief? What has caused the sorrows that
bespeak better and happier days, to those lavish out such heaps of misery?
You are aware that your instructive lessons embellish the mind with holy
truths, by wedding its attention to none but great and noble affections.
A. This, of course, is some consolation. I will ever love my own species
with feelings of a fond recollection, and while I am studying to advance the
universal philanthropy, and the spotless name of my own sex, I will try to
build my own upon the pleasing belief that I have accelerated the
advancement of one who whispers of departed confidence.

And I, like some poor peasant fated to reside

Remote from friends, in a forest wide.

Oh, see what woman's woes and human wants require,

Since that great day hath spread the seed of sinful fire.

G. Look up, thou poor disconsolate; you speak of quitting earthly
enjoyments. Unfold thy bosom to a friend, who would be willing to
sacrifice every enjoyment for the restoration of the dignity and gentleness
of mind which used to grace your walks, and which is so natural to
yourself; not only that, but your paths were strewed with flowers of every
hue and of every order.

With verdant green the mountains glow,

For thee, for thee, the lilies grow;

Far stretched beneath the tented hills,

A fairer flower the valley fills.

A. Oh, would to Heaven I could give you a short narrative of my former
prospects for happiness, since you have acknowledged to be an
unchangeable confidant—the richest of all other blessings. Oh, ye names
forever glorious, ye celebrated scenes, ye renowned spot of my hymeneal
moments; how replete is your chart with sublime reflections! How many
profound vows, decorated with immaculate deeds, are written upon the
surface of that precious spot of earth where I yielded up my life of celibacy,
bade youth with all its beauties a final adieu, took a last farewell of the
laurels that had accompanied me up the hill of my juvenile career. It was
then I began to descend toward the valley of disappointment and sorrow; it
was then I cast my little bark upon a mysterious ocean of wedlock, with him
who then smiled and caressed me, but, alas! now frowns with bitterness,
and has grown jealous and cold toward me, because the ring he gave me is
misplaced or lost. Oh, bear me, ye flowers of memory, softly through the
eventful history of past times; and ye places that have witnessed the
progression of man in the circle of so many societies, and, oh, aid my
recollection, while I endeavor to trace the vicissitudes of a life devoted in
endeavoring to comfort him that I claim as the object of my wishes.

Ah! ye mysterious men, of all the world, how few

Act just to Heaven and to your promise true!

But He who guides the stars with a watchful eye,

The deeds of men lay open without disguise;

Oh, this alone will avenge the wrongs I bear,

For all the oppressed are His peculiar care.

(F. makes a slight noise.)
A. Who is there—Farcillo?
G. Then I must gone. Heaven protect you. Oh, Amelia, farewell, be of
good cheer.

May you stand like Olympus' towers,

Against earth and all jealous powers!

May you, with loud shouts ascend on high

Swift as an eagle in the upper sky.

A. Why so cold and distant tonight, Farcillo? Come, let us each other
greet, and forget all the past, and give security for the future.
F. Security! talk to me about giving security for the future—what an
insulting requisition! Have you said your prayers tonight, Madam Amelia?
A. Farcillo, we sometimes forget our duty, particularly when we expect to
be caressed by others.
F. If you bethink yourself of any crime, or of any fault, that is yet
concealed from the courts of Heaven and the thrones of grace, I bid you ask
and solicit forgiveness for it now.
A. Oh, be kind, Farcillo, don't treat me so. What do you mean by all this?
F. Be kind, you say; you, madam, have forgot that kindness you owe to
me, and bestowed it upon another; you shall suffer for your conduct when
you make your peace with your God. I would not slay thy unprotected
spirit. I call to Heaven to be my guard and my watch—I would not kill thy
soul, in which all once seemed just, right, and perfect; but I must be brief,
woman.
A. What, talk you of killing? Oh, Farcillo, Farcillo, what is the matter?
F. Aye, I do, without doubt; mark what I say, Amelia.
A. Then, O God, O Heaven, and Angels, be propitious, and have mercy
upon me.
F. Amen to that, madam, with all my heart, and with all my soul.
A. Farcillo, listen to me one moment; I hope you will not kill me.
F. Kill you, aye, that I will; attest it, ye fair host of light, record it, ye dark
imps of hell!
A. Oh, I fear you—you are fatal when darkness covers your brow; yet I
know not why I should fear, since I never wronged you in all my life. I
stand, sir, guiltless before you.
F. You pretend to say you are guiltless! Think of thy sins, Amelia; think,
oh, think, hidden woman.
A. Wherein have I not been true to you? That death is unkind, cruel, and
unnatural, that kills for living.
F. Peace, and be still while I unfold to thee.
A. I will, Farcillo, and while I am thus silent, tell me the cause of such
cruel coldness in an hour like this.

F. That ring, oh, that ring I so loved, and gave thee as the ring of my
heart; the allegiance you took to be faithful, when it was presented; the
kisses and smiles with which you honored it. You became tired of the donor,
despised it as a plague, and finally gave it to Malos, the hidden, the vile
traitor.
A. No, upon my word and honor, I never did; I appeal to the Most High
to bear me out in this matter. Send for Malos, and ask him.
F. Send for Malos, aye! Malos you wish to see; I thought so. I knew you
could not keep his name concealed. Amelia, sweet Amelia, take heed, take
heed of perjury; you are on the stage of death, to suffer for your sins.
A. What, not to die I hope, my Farcillo, my ever beloved.
F. Yes, madam, to die a traitor's death. Shortly your spirit shall take its
exit; therefore confess freely thy sins, for to deny tends only to make me
groan under the bitter cup thou hast made for me. Thou art to die with the
name of traitor on thy brow!
A. Then, O Lord, have mercy upon me; give me courage, give me grace
and fortitude to stand this hour of trial.
F. Amen, I say, with all my heart.
A. And, oh, Farcillo, will you have mercy, too? I never intentionally
offended you in all my life, never loved Malos, never gave him cause to
think so, as the high court of Justice will acquit me before its tribunal.
F. Oh, false, perjured woman, thou didst chill my blood, and makest me a
demon like thyself. I saw the ring.
A. He found it, then, or got it clandestinely; send for him, and let him
confess the truth; let his confession be sifted.
F. And you still wish to see him! I tell you, madam, he hath already
confessed, and thou knowest the darkness of thy heart.
A. What, my deceived Farcillo, that I gave him the ring, in which all my
affections were concentrated? Oh, surely not.
F. Aye, he did. Ask thy conscience, and it will speak with a voice of
thunder to thy soul.
A. He will not say so, he dare not, he cannot.
F. No, he will not say so now, because his mouth, I trust, is hushed in
death, and his body stretched to the four winds of heaven, to be torn to

pieces by carnivorous birds.
A. What, he is dead, and gone to the world of spirits with that declaration
in his mouth? Oh, unhappy man! Oh, insupportable hour!
F. Yes, and had all his sighs and looks and tears been lives, my great
revenge could have slain them all, without the least condemnation.
A. Alas! he is ushered into eternity without testing the matter for which I
am abused and sentenced and condemned to die.
F. Cursed, infernal woman! Weepest thou for him to my face? He that
hath robbed me of my peace, my energy, the whole love of my life? Could I
call the fabled Hydra, I would have him live and perish, survive and die,
until the sun itself would grow dim with age. I would make him have the
thirst of a Tantalus, and roll the wheel of an Ixion, until the stars of heaven
should quit their brilliant stations.
A. Oh, invincible God, save me! Oh, unsupportable moment! Oh, heavy
hour! Banish me, Farcillo—send me where no eye can ever see me, where
no sound shall ever great my ear; but, oh, slay me not, Farcillo; vent thy
rage and thy spite upon this emaciated frame of mine, only spare my life.
F. Your petitions avail nothing, cruel Amelia.
A. Oh, Farcillo, perpetrate the dark deed tomorrow; let me live till then,
for my past kindness to you, and it may be some kind angel will show to
you that I am not only the object of innocence, but one who never loved
another but your noble self.
F. Amelia, the decree has gone forth, it is to be done, and that quickly;
thou art to die, madam.
A. But half an hour allow me, to see my father and my only child, to tell
her the treachery and vanity of this world.
F. There is no alternative, there is no pause: my daughter shall not see its
deceptive mother die; your father shall not know that his daughter fell
disgraced, despised by all but her enchanting Malos.
A. Oh, Farcillo, put up thy threatening dagger into its scabbard; let it rest
and be still, just while I say one prayer for thee and for my child.
F. It is too late, thy doom is fixed, thou hast not confessed to Heaven or
to me, my child's protector—thou art to die. Ye powers of earth and heaven,
protect and defend me in this alone. (Stabs her while imploring for mercy.)

A. Oh, Farcillo, Farcillo, a guiltless death I die.
F. Die! die! die!
(Gracia enters running, falls on her knees weeping, and kisses Amelia.)
G. Oh, Farcillo, Farcillo! oh, Farcillo!
F. I am here, the genius of the age, and the avenger of my wrongs.
G. Oh, lady, speak once more; sweet Amelia, oh, speak again. Gone,
gone—yes, forever gone! Farcillo, oh, cold-hearted Farcillo, some evil
fiend hath urged you to do this, Farcillo.
F. Say not so again, or you shall receive the same fate. I did the glorious
deed, madam—beware, then, how you talk.
G. I fear not your implements of war; I will let you know you have not
the power to do me harm. If you have a heart of triple brass, it shall be
reached and melted, and thy blood shall chill thy veins and grow stiff in thy
arteries. Here is the ring of the virtuous and innocent murdered Amelia; I
obtained it from Malos, who yet lives, in hopes that he will survive the
wound given him, and says he got it clandestinely—declares Amelia to be
the princess of truth and virtue, invulnerable to anything like forgetting her
first devotion to thee. The world has heard of your conduct and your
jealousy, and with one universal voice declares her to be the best of all in
piety; that she is the star of this great universe, and a more virtuous woman
never lived since the wheels of time began. Oh, had you waited till
tomorrow, or until I had returned, some kind window would have been
opened to her relief. But, alas! she is gone—yes, forever gone, to try the
realities of an unknown world!
(Farcillo leaning over the body of Amelia.)
F. Malos not dead, and here is my ring! Oh, Amelia! falsely murdered!
Oh, bloody deed! Oh, wretch that I am! Oh, angels forgive me! Oh, God,
withhold thy vengeance! Oh, Amelia! if Heaven would make a thousand
worlds like this, set with diamonds, and all of one perfect chrysolite, I
would not have done this for them all, I would not have frowned and cursed
as I did. Oh, she was heavenly true, nursed in the very lap of bright angels!
Cursed slave that I am! Jealousy, oh! thou infernal demon! Lost, lost to
every sense of honor! Oh! Amelia—heaven-born Amelia—dead, dead! Oh!
oh! oh!—then let me die with thee. Farewell! farewell! ye world that
deceived me! (Stabs himself.)

Soon after the excitement of this tragical scene was over, and the enlisted
feeling for Amelia had grown more buoyant with Elfonzo and Ambulinia,
he determined to visit his retired home, and make the necessary
improvements to enjoy a better day; consequently he conveyed the
following lines to Ambulinia:

Go tell the world that hope is glowing,

Go bid the rocks their silence break,

Go tell the stars that love is glowing,

Then bid the hero his lover take.

In the region where scarcely the foot of man hath ever trod, where the
woodman hath not found his way, lies a blooming grove, seen only by the
sun when he mounts his lofty throne, visited only by the light of the stars, to
whom are entrusted the guardianship of earth, before the sun sinks to rest in
his rosy bed. High cliffs of rocks surround the romantic place, and in the
small cavity of the rocky wall grows the daffodil clear and pure; and as the
wind blows along the enchanting little mountain which surrounds the lonely
spot, it nourishes the flowers with the dew-drops of heaven. Here is the seat
of Elfonzo; darkness claims but little victory over this dominion, and in
vain does she spread out her gloomy wings. Here the waters flow
perpetually, and the trees lash their tops together to bid the welcome visitor
a happy muse. Elfonzo, during his short stay in the country, had fully
persuaded himself that it was his duty to bring this solemn matter to an
issue. A duty that he individually owed, as a gentleman, to the parents of
Ambulinia, a duty in itself involving not only his own happiness and his
own standing in society, but one that called aloud the act of the parties to
make it perfect and complete. How he should communicate his intentions to
get a favorable reply, he was at a loss to know; he knew not whether to
address Esq. Valeer in prose or in poetry, in a jocular or an argumentative
manner, or whether he should use moral suasion, legal injunction, or seizure
and take by reprisal; if it was to do the latter, he would have no difficulty in
deciding in his own mind, but his gentlemanly honor was at stake; so he
concluded to address the following letter to the father and mother of
Ambulinia, as his address in person he knew would only aggravate the old
gentleman, and perhaps his lady.
Cumming, Ga., January 22, 1844

Mr. and Mrs. Valeer—
Again I resume the pleasing task of addressing you, and once more
beg an immediate answer to my many salutations. From every
circumstance that has taken place, I feel in duty bound to comply with
my obligations; to forfeit my word would be more than I dare do; to
break my pledge, and my vows that have been witnessed, sealed, and
delivered in the presence of an unseen Deity, would be disgraceful on
my part, as well as ruinous to Ambulinia. I wish no longer to be kept in
suspense about this matter. I wish to act gentlemanly in every
particular. It is true, the promises I have made are unknown to any but
Ambulinia, and I think it unnecessary to here enumerate them, as they
who promise the most generally perform the least. Can you for a
moment doubt my sincerity or my character? My only wish is, sir, that
you may calmly and dispassionately look at the situation of the case,
and if your better judgment should dictate otherwise, my obligations
may induce me to pluck the flower that you so diametrically opposed.
We have sworn by the saints—by the gods of battle, and by that faith
whereby just men are made perfect—to be united. I hope, my dear sir,
you will find it convenient as well as agreeable to give me a favorable
answer, with the signature of Mrs. Valeer, as well as yourself.
With very great esteem,
your humble servant,
J. I. Elfonzo.

The moon and stars had grown pale when Ambulinia had retired to rest.
A crowd of unpleasant thoughts passed through her bosom. Solitude dwelt
in her chamber—no sound from the neighboring world penetrated its
stillness; it appeared a temple of silence, of repose, and of mystery. At that
moment she heard a still voice calling her father. In an instant, like the flash
of lightning, a thought ran through her mind that it must be the bearer of
Elfonzo's communication. “It is not a dream!” she said, “no, I cannot read
dreams. Oh! I would to Heaven I was near that glowing eloquence—that
poetical language—it charms the mind in an inexpressible manner, and
warms the coldest heart.” While consoling herself with this strain, her father
rushed into her room almost frantic with rage, exclaiming: “Oh, Ambulinia!
Ambulinia!! undutiful, ungrateful daughter! What does this mean? Why
does this letter bear such heart-rending intelligence? Will you quit a father's
house with this debased wretch, without a place to lay his distracted head;
going up and down the country, with every novel object that may chance to
wander through this region. He is a pretty man to make love known to his
superiors, and you, Ambulinia, have done but little credit to yourself by
honoring his visits. Oh, wretchedness! can it be that my hopes of happiness
are forever blasted! Will you not listen to a father's entreaties, and pay some

regard to a mother's tears. I know, and I do pray that God will give me
fortitude to bear with this sea of troubles, and rescue my daughter, my
Ambulinia, as a brand from the eternal burning.” “Forgive me, father, oh!
forgive thy child,” replied Ambulinia. “My heart is ready to break, when I
see you in this grieved state of agitation. Oh! think not so meanly of me, as
that I mourn for my own danger. Father, I am only woman. Mother, I am
only the templement of thy youthful years, but will suffer courageously
whatever punishment you think proper to inflict upon me, if you will but
allow me to comply with my most sacred promises—if you will but give me
my personal right and my personal liberty. Oh, father! if your generosity
will but give me these, I ask nothing more. When Elfonzo offered me his
heart, I gave him my hand, never to forsake him, and now may the mighty
God banish me before I leave him in adversity. What a heart must I have to
rejoice in prosperity with him whose offers I have accepted, and then, when
poverty comes, haggard as it may be, for me to trifle with the oracles of
Heaven, and change with every fluctuation that may interrupt our happiness
—like the politician who runs the political gantlet for office one day, and
the next day, because the horizon is darkened a little, he is seen running for
his life, for fear he might perish in its ruins. Where is the philosophy, where
is the consistency, where is the charity, in conduct like this? Be happy then,
my beloved father, and forget me; let the sorrow of parting break down the
wall of separation and make us equal in our feeling; let me now say how
ardently I love you; let me kiss that age-worn cheek, and should my tears
bedew thy face, I will wipe them away. Oh, I never can forget you; no,
never, never!”
“Weep not,” said the father, “Ambulinia. I will forbid Elfonzo my house,
and desire that you may keep retired a few days. I will let him know that my
friendship for my family is not linked together by cankered chains; and if he
ever enters upon my premises again, I will send him to his long home.”
“Oh, father! let me entreat you to be calm upon this occasion, and though
Elfonzo may be the sport of the clouds and winds, yet I feel assured that no
fate will send him to the silent tomb until the God of the Universe calls him
hence with a triumphant voice.”
Here the father turned away, exclaiming: “I will answer his letter in a
very few words, and you, madam, will have the goodness to stay at home
with your mother; and remember, I am determined to protect you from the
consuming fire that looks so fair to your view.”

Cumming, January 22, 1844.
Sir—In regard to your request, I am as I ever have been, utterly
opposed to your marrying into my family; and if you have any regard
for yourself, or any gentlemanly feeling, I hope you will mention it to
me no more; but seek some other one who is not so far superior to you
in standing.
W. W. Valeer.

When Elfonzo read the above letter, he became so much depressed in
spirits that many of his friends thought it advisable to use other means to
bring about the happy union. “Strange,” said he, “that the contents of this
diminutive letter should cause me to have such depressed feelings; but there
is a nobler theme than this. I know not why my military title is not as great
as that of Squire Valeer. For my life I cannot see that my ancestors are
inferior to those who are so bitterly opposed to my marriage with
Ambulinia. I know I have seen huge mountains before me, yet, when I think
that I know gentlemen will insult me upon this delicate matter, should I
become angry at fools and babblers, who pride themselves in their
impudence and ignorance? No. My equals! I know not where to find them.
My inferiors! I think it beneath me; and my superiors! I think it
presumption; therefore, if this youthful heart is protected by any of the
divine rights, I never will betray my trust.”
He was aware that Ambulinia had a confidence that was, indeed, as firm
and as resolute as she was beautiful and interesting. He hastened to the
cottage of Louisa, who received him in her usual mode of pleasantness, and
informed him that Ambulinia had just that moment left. “Is it possible?”
said Elfonzo. “Oh, murdered hours! Why did she not remain and be the
guardian of my secrets? But hasten and tell me how she has stood this
trying scene, and what are her future determinations.” “You know,” said
Louisa, “Major Elfonzo, that you have Ambulinia's first love, which is of no
small consequence. She came here about twilight, and shed many precious
tears in consequence of her own fate with yours. We walked silently in yon
little valley you see, where we spent a momentary repose. She seemed to be
quite as determined as ever, and before we left that beautiful spot she
offered up a prayer to Heaven for thee.” “I will see her then,” replied
Elfonzo, “though legions of enemies may oppose. She is mine by
foreordination—she is mine by prophesy—she is mine by her own free will,
and I will rescue her from the hands of her oppressors. Will you not, Miss
Louisa, assist me in my capture?”

“I will certainly, by the aid of Divine Providence,” answered Louisa,
“endeavor to break those slavish chains that bind the richest of prizes;
though allow me, Major, to entreat you to use no harsh means on this
important occasion; take a decided stand, and write freely to Ambulinia
upon this subject, and I will see that no intervening cause hinders its
passage to her. God alone will save a mourning people. Now is the day and
now is the hour to obey a command of such valuable worth.” The Major felt
himself grow stronger after this short interview with Louisa. He felt as if he
could whip his weight in wildcats—he knew he was master of his own
feelings, and could now write a letter that would bring this litigation to an
issue.
Cumming, January 24, 1844.
Dear Ambulinia—
We have now reached the most trying moment of our lives; we are
pledged not to forsake our trust; we have waited for a favorable hour
to come, thinking your friends would settle the matter agreeably
among themselves, and finally be reconciled to our marriage; but as I
have waited in vain, and looked in vain, I have determined in my own
mind to make a proposition to you, though you may think it not in
accord with your station, or compatible with your rank; yet, “sub hoc
signo vinces.” You know I cannot resume my visits, in consequence of
the utter hostility that your father has to me; therefore the
consummation of our union will have to be sought for in a more
sublime sphere, at the residence of a respectable friend of this village.
You cannot have any scruples upon this mode of proceeding, if you
will but remember it emanates from one who loves you better than his
own life—who is more than anxious to bid you welcome to a new and
happy home. Your warmest associates say come; the talented, the
learned, the wise, and the experienced say come;—all these with their
friends say, come. Viewing these, with many other inducements, I
flatter myself that you will come to the embraces of your Elfonzo; for
now is the time of your acceptance of the day of your liberation. You
cannot be ignorant, Ambulinia, that thou art the desire of my heart; its
thoughts are too noble, and too pure, to conceal themselves from you. I
shall wait for your answer to this impatiently, expecting that you will
set the time to make your departure, and to be in readiness at a
moment's warning to share the joys of a more preferable life. This will
be handed to you by Louisa, who will take a pleasure in
communicating anything to you that may relieve your dejected spirits,
and will assure you that I now stand ready, willing, and waiting to
make good my vows.
I am, dear Ambulinia, yours
truly, and forever,
J. I. Elfonzo.

Louisa made it convenient to visit Mr. Valeer's, though they did not
suspect her in the least the bearer of love epistles; consequently, she was
invited in the room to console Ambulinia, where they were left alone.
Ambulinia was seated by a small table—her head resting on her hand—her
brilliant eyes were bathed in tears. Louisa handed her the letter of Elfonzo,
when another spirit animated her features—the spirit of renewed confidence
that never fails to strengthen the female character in an hour of grief and
sorrow like this, and as she pronounced the last accent of his name, she
exclaimed, “And does he love me yet! I never will forget your generosity,
Louisa. Oh, unhappy and yet blessed Louisa! may you never feel what I
have felt—may you never know the pangs of love. Had I never loved, I
never would have been unhappy; but I turn to Him who can save, and if His
wisdom does not will my expected union, I know He will give me strength
to bear my lot. Amuse yourself with this little book, and take it as an
apology for my silence,” said Ambulinia, “while I attempt to answer this
volume of consolation.” “Thank you,” said Louisa, “you are excusable upon
this occasion; but I pray you, Ambulinia, to be expert upon this momentous
subject, that there may be nothing mistrustful upon my part.” “I will,” said
Ambulinia, and immediately resumed her seat and addressed the following
to Elfonzo:
Cumming, Ga., January 28, 1844.
Devoted Elfonzo—
I hail your letter as a welcome messenger of faith, and can now say
truly and firmly that my feelings correspond with yours. Nothing shall
be wanting on my part to make my obedience your fidelity. Courage
and perseverance will accomplish success. Receive this as my oath,
that while I grasp your hand in my own imagination, we stand united
before a higher tribunal than any on earth. All the powers of my life,
soul, and body, I devote to thee. Whatever dangers may threaten me, I
fear not to encounter them. Perhaps I have determined upon my own
destruction, by leaving the house of the best of parents; be it so; I flee
to you; I share your destiny, faithful to the end. The day that I have
concluded upon for this task is sabbath next, when the family with the
citizens are generally at church. For Heaven's sake let not that day pass
unimproved: trust not till tomorrow, it is the cheat of life—the future
that never comes—the grave of many noble births—the cavern of
ruined enterprise: which like the lightning's flash is born, and dies, and
perishes, ere the voice of him who sees can cry, behold! behold!! You
may trust to what I say, no power shall tempt me to betray confidence.
Suffer me to add one word more.

I will soothe thee, in all thy grief,

Beside the gloomy river;

And though thy love may yet be brief;

Mine is fixed forever.

Receive the deepest emotions of my heart for thy constant love, and
may the power of inspiration be thy guide, thy portion, and thy all. In
great haste,
Yours faithfully,
Ambulinia.

“I now take my leave of you, sweet girl,” said Louisa, “sincerely wishing
you success on Sabbath next.” When Ambulinia's letter was handed to
Elfonzo, he perused it without doubting its contents. Louisa charged him to
make but few confidants; but like most young men who happened to win
the heart of a beautiful girl, he was so elated with the idea that he felt as a
commanding general on parade, who had confidence in all, consequently
gave orders to all. The appointed Sabbath, with a delicious breeze and
cloudless sky, made its appearance. The people gathered in crowds to the
church—the streets were filled with neighboring citizens, all marching to
the house of worship. It is entirely useless for me to attempt to describe the
feelings of Elfonzo and Ambulinia, who were silently watching the
movements of the multitude, apparently counting them as then entered the
house of God, looking for the last one to darken the door. The impatience
and anxiety with which they waited, and the bliss they anticipated on the
eventful day, is altogether indescribable. Those that have been so fortunate
as to embark in such a noble enterprise know all its realities; and those who
have not had this inestimable privilege will have to taste its sweets before
they can tell to others its joys, its comforts, and its Heaven-born worth.
Immediately after Ambulinia had assisted the family off to church, she took
advantage of that opportunity to make good her promises. She left a home
of enjoyment to be wedded to one whose love had been justifiable. A few
short steps brought her to the presence of Louisa, who urged her to make
good use of her time, and not to delay a moment, but to go with her to her
brother's house, where Elfonzo would forever make her happy. With lively
speed, and yet a graceful air, she entered the door and found herself
protected by the champion of her confidence. The necessary arrangements
were fast making to have the two lovers united—everything was in
readiness except the parson; and as they are generally very sanctimonious

on such occasions, the news got to the parents of Ambulinia before the
everlasting knot was tied, and they both came running, with uplifted hands
and injured feelings, to arrest their daughter from an unguarded and hasty
resolution. Elfonzo desired to maintain his ground, but Ambulinia thought it
best for him to leave, to prepare for a greater contest. He accordingly
obeyed, as it would have been a vain endeavor for him to have battled
against a man who was armed with deadly weapons; and besides, he could
not resist the request of such a pure heart. Ambulinia concealed herself in
the upper story of the house, fearing the rebuke of her father; the door was
locked, and no chastisement was now expected. Esquire Valeer, whose pride
was already touched, resolved to preserve the dignity of his family. He
entered the house almost exhausted, looking wildly for Ambulinia.
“Amazed and astonished indeed I am,” said he, “at a people who call
themselves civilized, to allow such behavior as this. Ambulinia,
Ambulinia!” he cried, “come to the calls of your first, your best, and your
only friend. I appeal to you, sir,” turning to the gentleman of the house, “to
know where Ambulinia has gone, or where is she?” “Do you mean to insult
me, sir, in my own house?” inquired the gentleman. “I will burst,” said Mr.
V., “asunder every door in your dwelling, in search of my daughter, if you
do not speak quickly, and tell me where she is. I care nothing about that
outcast rubbish of creation, that mean, low-lived Elfonzo, if I can but obtain
Ambulinia. Are you not going to open this door?” said he. “By the Eternal
that made Heaven and earth! I will go about the work instantly, if this is not
done!” The confused citizens gathered from all parts of the village, to know
the cause of this commotion. Some rushed into the house; the door that was
locked flew open, and there stood Ambulinia, weeping. “Father, be still,”
said she, “and I will follow thee home.” But the agitated man seized her,
and bore her off through the gazing multitude. “Father!” she exclaimed, “I
humbly beg your pardon—I will be dutiful—I will obey thy commands. Let
the sixteen years I have lived in obedience to thee be my future security.” “I
don't like to be always giving credit, when the old score is not paid up,
madam,” said the father. The mother followed almost in a state of
derangement, crying and imploring her to think beforehand, and ask advice
from experienced persons, and they would tell her it was a rash
undertaking. “Oh!” said she, “Ambulinia, my daughter, did you know what
I have suffered—did you know how many nights I have whiled away in

agony, in pain, and in fear, you would pity the sorrows of a heartbroken
mother.”
“Well, mother,” replied Ambulinia, “I know I have been disobedient; I
am aware that what I have done might have been done much better; but oh!
what shall I do with my honor? it is so dear to me; I am pledged to Elfonzo.
His high moral worth is certainly worth some attention; moreover, my
vows, I have no doubt, are recorded in the book of life, and must I give
these all up? must my fair hopes be forever blasted? Forbid it, father; oh!
forbid it, mother; forbid it, Heaven.” “I have seen so many beautiful skies
overclouded,” replied the mother, “so many blossoms nipped by the frost,
that I am afraid to trust you to the care of those fair days, which may be
interrupted by thundering and tempestuous nights. You no doubt think as I
did—life's devious ways were strewn with sweet-scented flowers, but ah!
how long they have lingered around me and took their flight in the vivid
hope that laughs at the drooping victims it has murdered.” Elfonzo was
moved at this sight. The people followed on to see what was going to
become of Ambulinia, while he, with downcast looks, kept at a distance,
until he saw them enter the abode of the father, thrusting her, that was the
sigh of his soul, out of his presence into a solitary apartment, when she
exclaimed, “Elfonzo! Elfonzo! oh, Elfonzo! where art thou, with all thy
heroes? haste, oh! haste, come thou to my relief. Ride on the wings of the
wind! Turn thy force loose like a tempest, and roll on thy army like a
whirlwind, over this mountain of trouble and confusion. Oh, friends! if any
pity me, let your last efforts throng upon the green hills, and come to the
relief of Ambulinia, who is guilty of nothing but innocent love.” Elfonzo
called out with a loud voice, “My God, can I stand this! arise up, I beseech
you, and put an end to this tyranny. Come, my brave boys,” said he, “are
you ready to go forth to your duty?” They stood around him. “Who,” said
he, “will call us to arms? Where are my thunderbolts of war? Speak ye, the
first who will meet the foe! Who will go forward with me in this ocean of
grievous temptation? If there is one who desires to go, let him come and
shake hands upon the altar of devotion, and swear that he will be a hero;
yes, a Hector in a cause like this, which calls aloud for a speedy remedy.”
“Mine be the deed,” said a young lawyer, “and mine alone; Venus alone
shall quit her station before I will forsake one jot or tittle of my promise to
you; what is death to me? what is all this warlike army, if it is not to win a
victory? I love the sleep of the lover and the mighty; nor would I give it

over till the blood of my enemies should wreak with that of my own. But
God forbid that our fame should soar on the blood of the slumberer.” Mr.
Valeer stands at his door with the frown of a demon upon his brow, with his
dangerous weapon ready to strike the first man who should enter his door.
“Who will arise and go forward through blood and carnage to the rescue of
my Ambulinia?” said Elfonzo. “All,” exclaimed the multitude; and onward
they went, with their implements of battle. Others, of a more timid nature,
stood among the distant hills to see the result of the contest.
Elfonzo took the lead of his band. Night arose in clouds; darkness
concealed the heavens; but the blazing hopes that stimulated them gleamed
in every bosom. All approached the anxious spot; they rushed to the front of
the house and, with one exclamation, demanded Ambulinia. “Away, begone,
and disturb my peace no more,” said Mr. Valeer. “You are a set of base,
insolent, and infernal rascals. Go, the northern star points your path through
the dim twilight of the night; go, and vent your spite upon the lonely hills;
pour forth your love, you poor, weak-minded wretch, upon your idleness
and upon your guitar, and your fiddle; they are fit subjects for your
admiration, for let me assure you, though this sword and iron lever are
cankered, yet they frown in sleep, and let one of you dare to enter my house
this night and you shall have the contents and the weight of these
instruments.” “Never yet did base dishonor blur my name,” said Elfonzo;
“mine is a cause of renown; here are my warriors; fear and tremble, for this
night, though hell itself should oppose, I will endeavor to avenge her whom
thou hast banished in solitude. The voice of Ambulinia shall be heard from
that dark dungeon.” At that moment Ambulinia appeared at the window
above, and with a tremulous voice said, “Live, Elfonzo! oh! live to raise my
stone of moss! why should such language enter your heart? why should thy
voice rend the air with such agitation? I bid thee live, once more
remembering these tears of mine are shed alone for thee, in this dark and
gloomy vault, and should I perish under this load of trouble, join the song
of thrilling accents with the raven above my grave, and lay this tattered
frame beside the banks of the Chattahoochee or the stream of Sawney's
brook; sweet will be the song of death to your Ambulinia. My ghost shall
visit you in the smiles of Paradise, and tell your high fame to the minds of
that region, which is far more preferable than this lonely cell. My heart shall
speak for thee till the latest hour; I know faint and broken are the sounds of
sorrow, yet our souls, Elfonzo, shall hear the peaceful songs together. One

bright name shall be ours on high, if we are not permitted to be united here;
bear in mind that I still cherish my old sentiments, and the poet will mingle
the names of Elfonzo and Ambulinia in the tide of other days.” “Fly,
Elfonzo,” said the voices of his united band, “to the wounded heart of your
beloved. All enemies shall fall beneath thy sword. Fly through the clefts,
and the dim spark shall sleep in death.” Elfonzo rushes forward and strikes
his shield against the door, which was barricaded, to prevent any
intercourse. His brave sons throng around him. The people pour along the
streets, both male and female, to prevent or witness the melancholy scene.
“To arms, to arms!” cried Elfonzo; “here is a victory to be won, a prize to
be gained that is more to me that the whole world beside.” “It cannot be
done tonight,” said Mr. Valeer. “I bear the clang of death; my strength and
armor shall prevail. My Ambulinia shall rest in this hall until the break of
another day, and if we fall, we fall together. If we die, we die clinging to our
tattered rights, and our blood alone shall tell the mournful tale of a
murdered daughter and a ruined father.” Sure enough, he kept watch all
night, and was successful in defending his house and family. The bright
morning gleamed upon the hills, night vanished away, the Major and his
associates felt somewhat ashamed that they had not been as fortunate as
they expected to have been; however, they still leaned upon their arms in
dispersed groups; some were walking the streets, others were talking in the
Major's behalf. Many of the citizen suspended business, as the town
presented nothing but consternation. A novelty that might end in the
destruction of some worthy and respectable citizens. Mr. Valeer ventured in
the streets, though not without being well armed. Some of his friends
congratulated him on the decided stand he had taken, and hoped he would
settle the matter amicably with Elfonzo, without any serious injury. “Me,”
he replied, “what, me, condescend to fellowship with a coward, and a low-
lived, lazy, undermining villain? no, gentlemen, this cannot be; I had rather
be borne off, like the bubble upon the dark blue ocean, with Ambulinia by
my side, than to have him in the ascending or descending line of
relationship. Gentlemen,” continued he, “if Elfonzo is so much of a
distinguished character, and is so learned in the fine arts, why do you not
patronize such men? why not introduce him into your families, as a
gentleman of taste and of unequaled magnanimity? why are you so very
anxious that he should become a relative of mine? Oh, gentlemen, I fear
you yet are tainted with the curiosity of our first parents, who were beguiled

by the poisonous kiss of an old ugly serpent, and who, for one apple,
damned all mankind. I wish to divest myself, as far as possible, of that
untutored custom. I have long since learned that the perfection of wisdom,
and the end of true philosophy, is to proportion our wants to our
possessions, our ambition to our capacities; we will then be a happy and a
virtuous people.” Ambulinia was sent off to prepare for a long and tedious
journey. Her new acquaintances had been instructed by her father how to
treat her, and in what manner, and to keep the anticipated visit entirely
secret. Elfonzo was watching the movements of everybody; some friends
had told him of the plot that was laid to carry off Ambulinia. At night, he
rallied some two or three of his forces, and went silently along to the stately
mansion; a faint and glimmering light showed through the windows; lightly
he steps to the door; there were many voices rallying fresh in fancy's eye;
he tapped the shutter; it was opened instantly, and he beheld once more,
seated beside several ladies, the hope of all his toils; he rushed toward her,
she rose from her seat, rejoicing; he made one mighty grasp, when
Ambulinia exclaimed, “Huzza for Major Elfonzo! I will defend myself and
you, too, with this conquering instrument I hold in my hand; huzza, I say, I
now invoke time's broad wing to shed around us some dewdrops of verdant
spring.”
But the hour had not come for this joyous reunion; her friends struggled
with Elfonzo for some time, and finally succeeded in arresting her from his
hands. He dared not injure them, because they were matrons whose courage
needed no spur; she was snatched from the arms of Elfonzo, with so much
eagerness, and yet with such expressive signification, that he calmly
withdrew from this lovely enterprise, with an ardent hope that he should be
lulled to repose by the zephyrs which whispered peace to his soul. Several
long days and nights passed unmolested, all seemed to have grounded their
arms of rebellion, and no callidity appeared to be going on with any of the
parties. Other arrangements were made by Ambulinia; she feigned herself to
be entirely the votary of a mother's care, and she, by her graceful smiles,
that manhood might claim his stern dominion in some other region, where
such boisterous love was not so prevalent. This gave the parents a
confidence that yielded some hours of sober joy; they believed that
Ambulinia would now cease to love Elfonzo, and that her stolen affections
would now expire with her misguided opinions. They therefore declined the
idea of sending her to a distant land. But oh! they dreamed not of the

rapture that dazzled the fancy of Ambulinia, who would say, when alone,
youth should not fly away on his rosy pinions, and leave her to grapple in
the conflict with unknown admirers.

No frowning age shall control

The constant current of my soul,

Nor a tear from pity's eye

Shall check my sympathetic sigh.

With this resolution fixed in her mind, one dark and dreary night, when
the winds whistled and the tempest roared, she received intelligence that
Elfonzo was then waiting, and every preparation was then ready, at the
residence of Dr. Tully, and for her to make a quick escape while the family
was reposing. Accordingly she gathered her books, went the wardrobe
supplied with a variety of ornamental dressing, and ventured alone in the
streets to make her way to Elfonzo, who was near at hand, impatiently
looking and watching her arrival. “What forms,” said she, “are those rising
before me? What is that dark spot on the clouds? I do wonder what frightful
ghost that is, gleaming on the red tempest? Oh, be merciful and tell me
what region you are from. Oh, tell me, ye strong spirits, or ye dark and
fleeting clouds, that I yet have a friend.” “A friend,” said a low, whispering
voice. “I am thy unchanging, thy aged, and thy disappointed mother. Why
brandish in that hand of thine a javelin of pointed steel? Why suffer that lip
I have kissed a thousand times to equivocate? My daughter, let these tears
sink deep into thy soul, and no longer persist in that which may be your
destruction and ruin. Come, my dear child, retract your steps, and bear me
company to your welcome home.” Without one retorting word, or frown
from her brow, she yielded to the entreaties of her mother, and with all the
mildness of her former character she went along with the silver lamp of age,
to the home of candor and benevolence. Her father received her cold and
formal politeness—“Where has Ambulinia been, this blustering evening,
Mrs. Valeer?” inquired he. “Oh, she and I have been taking a solitary walk,”
said the mother; “all things, I presume, are now working for the best.”
Elfonzo heard this news shortly after it happened. “What,” said he, “has
heaven and earth turned against me? I have been disappointed times without
number. Shall I despair?—must I give it over? Heaven's decrees will not

fade; I will write again—I will try again; and if it traverses a gory field, I
pray forgiveness at the altar of justice.”
Desolate Hill, Cumming, Geo., 1844.
Unconquered and Beloved Ambulinia— I have only time to say to
you, not to despair; thy fame shall not perish; my visions are
brightening before me. The whirlwind's rage is past, and we now shall
subdue our enemies without doubt. On Monday morning, when your
friends are at breakfast, they will not suspect your departure, or even
mistrust me being in town, as it has been reported advantageously that
I have left for the west. You walk carelessly toward the academy
grove, where you will find me with a lightning steed, elegantly
equipped to bear you off where we shall be joined in wedlock with the
first connubial rights. Fail not to do this—think not of the tedious
relations of our wrongs—be invincible. You alone occupy all my
ambition, and I alone will make you my happy spouse, with the same
unimpeached veracity. I remain, forever, your devoted friend and
admirer, J. I. Elfonzo.

The appointed day ushered in undisturbed by any clouds; nothing
disturbed Ambulinia's soft beauty. With serenity and loveliness she obeys
the request of Elfonzo. The moment the family seated themselves at the
table—“Excuse my absence for a short time,” said she, “while I attend to
the placing of those flowers, which should have been done a week ago.”
And away she ran to the sacred grove, surrounded with glittering pearls,
that indicated her coming. Elfonzo hails her with his silver bow and his
golden harp. They meet—Ambulinia's countenance brightens—Elfonzo
leads up his winged steed. “Mount,” said he, “ye true-hearted, ye fearless
soul—the day is ours.” She sprang upon the back of the young thunder bolt,
a brilliant star sparkles upon her head, with one hand she grasps the reins,
and with the other she holds an olive branch. “Lend thy aid, ye strong
winds,” they exclaimed, “ye moon, ye sun, and all ye fair host of heaven,
witness the enemy conquered.” “Hold,” said Elfonzo, “thy dashing steed.”
“Ride on,” said Ambulinia, “the voice of thunder is behind us.” And onward
they went, with such rapidity that they very soon arrived at Rural Retreat,
where they dismounted, and were united with all the solemnities that
usually attend such divine operations. They passed the day in thanksgiving
and great rejoicing, and on that evening they visited their uncle, where
many of their friends and acquaintances had gathered to congratulate them
in the field of untainted bliss. The kind old gentleman met them in the yard:
“Well,” said he, “I wish I may die, Elfonzo, if you and Ambulinia haven't
tied a knot with your tongue that you can't untie with your teeth. But come

in, come in, never mind, all is right—the world still moves on, and no one
has fallen in this great battle.”
Happy now is their lot! Unmoved by misfortune, they live among the fair
beauties of the South. Heaven spreads their peace and fame upon the arch
of the rainbow, and smiles propitiously at their triumph, through the tears of
the storm.

THE CALIFORNIAN'S TALE
Thirty-five years ago I was out prospecting on the Stanislaus, tramping
all day long with pick and pan and horn, and washing a hatful of dirt here
and there, always expecting to make a rich strike, and never doing it. It was
a lovely region, woodsy, balmy, delicious, and had once been populous,
long years before, but now the people had vanished and the charming
paradise was a solitude. They went away when the surface diggings gave
out. In one place, where a busy little city with banks and newspapers and
fire companies and a mayor and aldermen had been, was nothing but a wide
expanse of emerald turf, with not even the faintest sign that human life had
ever been present there. This was down toward Tuttletown. In the country
neighborhood thereabouts, along the dusty roads, one found at intervals the
prettiest little cottage homes, snug and cozy, and so cobwebbed with vines
snowed thick with roses that the doors and windows were wholly hidden
from sight—sign that these were deserted homes, forsaken years ago by
defeated and disappointed families who could neither sell them nor give
them away. Now and then, half an hour apart, one came across solitary log
cabins of the earliest mining days, built by the first gold-miners, the
predecessors of the cottage-builders. In some few cases these cabins were
still occupied; and when this was so, you could depend upon it that the
occupant was the very pioneer who had built the cabin; and you could
depend on another thing, too—that he was there because he had once had
his opportunity to go home to the States rich, and had not done it; had rather
lost his wealth, and had then in his humiliation resolved to sever all
communication with his home relatives and friends, and be to them
thenceforth as one dead. Round about California in that day were scattered
a host of these living dead men—pride-smitten poor fellows, grizzled and
old at forty, whose secret thoughts were made all of regrets and longings—
regrets for their wasted lives, and longings to be out of the struggle and
done with it all.
It was a lonesome land! Not a sound in all those peaceful expanses of
grass and woods but the drowsy hum of insects; no glimpse of man or
beast; nothing to keep up your spirits and make you glad to be alive. And

so, at last, in the early part of the afternoon, when I caught sight of a human
creature, I felt a most grateful uplift. This person was a man about forty-five
years old, and he was standing at the gate of one of those cozy little rose-
clad cottages of the sort already referred to. However, this one hadn't a
deserted look; it had the look of being lived in and petted and cared for and
looked after; and so had its front yard, which was a garden of flowers,
abundant, gay, and flourishing. I was invited in, of course, and required to
make myself at home—it was the custom of the country.
It was delightful to be in such a place, after long weeks of daily and
nightly familiarity with miners' cabins—with all which this implies of dirt
floor, never-made beds, tin plates and cups, bacon and beans and black
coffee, and nothing of ornament but war pictures from the Eastern
illustrated papers tacked to the log walls. That was all hard, cheerless,
materialistic desolation, but here was a nest which had aspects to rest the
tired eye and refresh that something in one's nature which, after long
fasting, recognizes, when confronted by the belongings of art, howsoever
cheap and modest they may be, that it has unconsciously been famishing
and now has found nourishment. I could not have believed that a rag carpet
could feast me so, and so content me; or that there could be such solace to
the soul in wall-paper and framed lithographs, and bright-colored tidies and
lamp-mats, and Windsor chairs, and varnished what-nots, with sea-shells
and books and china vases on them, and the score of little unclassifiable
tricks and touches that a woman's hand distributes about a home, which one
sees without knowing he sees them, yet would miss in a moment if they
were taken away. The delight that was in my heart showed in my face, and
the man saw it and was pleased; saw it so plainly that he answered it as if it
had been spoken.
“All her work,” he said, caressingly; “she did it all herself—every bit,”
and he took the room in with a glance which was full of affectionate
worship. One of those soft Japanese fabrics with which women drape with
careful negligence the upper part of a picture-frame was out of adjustment.
He noticed it, and rearranged it with cautious pains, stepping back several
times to gauge the effect before he got it to suit him. Then he gave it a light
finishing pat or two with his hand, and said: “She always does that. You
can't tell just what it lacks, but it does lack something until you've done that
—you can see it yourself after it's done, but that is all you know; you can't
find out the law of it. It's like the finishing pats a mother gives the child's

hair after she's got it combed and brushed, I reckon. I've seen her fix all
these things so much that I can do them all just her way, though I don't
know the law of any of them. But she knows the law. She knows the why
and the how both; but I don't know the why; I only know the how.”
He took me into a bedroom so that I might wash my hands; such a
bedroom as I had not seen for years: white counterpane, white pillows,
carpeted floor, papered walls, pictures, dressing-table, with mirror and pin-
cushion and dainty toilet things; and in the corner a wash-stand, with real
china-ware bowl and pitcher, and with soap in a china dish, and on a rack
more than a dozen towels—towels too clean and white for one out of
practice to use without some vague sense of profanation. So my face spoke
again, and he answered with gratified words:
“All her work; she did it all herself—every bit. Nothing here that hasn't
felt the touch of her hand. Now you would think—But I mustn't talk so
much.”
By this time I was wiping my hands and glancing from detail to detail of
the room's belongings, as one is apt to do when he is in a new place, where
everything he sees is a comfort to his eye and his spirit; and I became
conscious, in one of those unaccountable ways, you know, that there was
something there somewhere that the man wanted me to discover for myself.
I knew it perfectly, and I knew he was trying to help me by furtive
indications with his eye, so I tried hard to get on the right track, being eager
to gratify him. I failed several times, as I could see out of the corner of my
eye without being told; but at last I knew I must be looking straight at the
thing—knew it from the pleasure issuing in invisible waves from him. He
broke into a happy laugh, and rubbed his hands together, and cried out:
“That's it! You've found it. I knew you would. It's her picture.”
I went to the little black-walnut bracket on the farther wall, and did find
there what I had not yet noticed—a daguerreotype-case. It contained the
sweetest girlish face, and the most beautiful, as it seemed to me, that I had
ever seen. The man drank the admiration from my face, and was fully
satisfied.
“Nineteen her last birthday,” he said, as he put the picture back; “and that
was the day we were married. When you see her—ah, just wait till you see
her!”
“Where is she? When will she be in?”

“Oh, she's away now. She's gone to see her people. They live forty or
fifty miles from here. She's been gone two weeks today.”
“When do you expect her back?”
“This is Wednesday. She'll be back Saturday, in the evening—about nine
o'clock, likely.”
I felt a sharp sense of disappointment.
“I'm sorry, because I'll be gone then,” I said, regretfully.
“Gone? No—why should you go? Don't go. She'll be disappointed.”
She would be disappointed—that beautiful creature! If she had said the
words herself they could hardly have blessed me more. I was feeling a deep,
strong longing to see her—a longing so supplicating, so insistent, that it
made me afraid. I said to myself: “I will go straight away from this place,
for my peace of mind's sake.”
“You see, she likes to have people come and stop with us—people who
know things, and can talk—people like you. She delights in it; for she
knows—oh, she knows nearly everything herself, and can talk, oh, like a
bird—and the books she reads, why, you would be astonished. Don't go; it's
only a little while, you know, and she'll be so disappointed.”
I heard the words, but hardly noticed them, I was so deep in my thinkings
and strugglings. He left me, but I didn't know. Presently he was back, with
the picture case in his hand, and he held it open before me and said:
“There, now, tell her to her face you could have stayed to see her, and
you wouldn't.”
That second glimpse broke down my good resolution. I would stay and
take the risk. That night we smoked the tranquil pipe, and talked till late
about various things, but mainly about her; and certainly I had had no such
pleasant and restful time for many a day. The Thursday followed and
slipped comfortably away. Toward twilight a big miner from three miles
away came—one of the grizzled, stranded pioneers—and gave us warm
salutation, clothed in grave and sober speech. Then he said:
“I only just dropped over to ask about the little madam, and when is she
coming home. Any news from her?”
“Oh, yes, a letter. Would you like to hear it, Tom?”
“Well, I should think I would, if you don't mind, Henry!”

Henry got the letter out of his wallet, and said he would skip some of the
private phrases, if we were willing; then he went on and read the bulk of it
—a loving, sedate, and altogether charming and gracious piece of
handiwork, with a postscript full of affectionate regards and messages to
Tom, and Joe, and Charley, and other close friends and neighbors.
As the reader finished, he glanced at Tom, and cried out:
“Oho, you're at it again! Take your hands away, and let me see your eyes.
You always do that when I read a letter from her. I will write and tell her.”
“Oh no, you mustn't, Henry. I'm getting old, you know, and any little
disappointment makes me want to cry. I thought she'd be here herself, and
now you've got only a letter.”
“Well, now, what put that in your head? I thought everybody knew she
wasn't coming till Saturday.”
“Saturday! Why, come to think, I did know it. I wonder what's the matter
with me lately? Certainly I knew it. Ain't we all getting ready for her? Well,
I must be going now. But I'll be on hand when she comes, old man!”
Late Friday afternoon another gray veteran tramped over from his cabin a
mile or so away, and said the boys wanted to have a little gaiety and a good
time Saturday night, if Henry thought she wouldn't be too tired after her
journey to be kept up.
“Tired? She tired! Oh, hear the man! Joe, you know she'd sit up six weeks
to please any one of you!”
When Joe heard that there was a letter, he asked to have it read, and the
loving messages in it for him broke the old fellow all up; but he said he was
such an old wreck that that would happen to him if she only just mentioned
his name. “Lord, we miss her so!” he said.
Saturday afternoon I found I was taking out my watch pretty often. Henry
noticed it, and said, with a startled look:
“You don't think she ought to be here soon, do you?”
I felt caught, and a little embarrassed; but I laughed, and said it was a
habit of mine when I was in a state of expenctancy. But he didn't seem quite
satisfied; and from that time on he began to show uneasiness. Four times he
walked me up the road to a point whence we could see a long distance; and
there he would stand, shading his eyes with his hand, and looking. Several
times he said:

“I'm getting worried, I'm getting right down worried. I know she's not
due till about nine o'clock, and yet something seems to be trying to warn me
that something's happened. You don't think anything has happened, do
you?”
I began to get pretty thoroughly ashamed of him for his childishness; and
at last, when he repeated that imploring question still another time, I lost my
patience for the moment, and spoke pretty brutally to him. It seemed to
shrivel him up and cow him; and he looked so wounded and so humble
after that, that I detested myself for having done the cruel and unnecessary
thing. And so I was glad when Charley, another veteran, arrived toward the
edge of the evening, and nestled up to Henry to hear the letter read, and
talked over the preparations for the welcome. Charley fetched out one
hearty speech after another, and did his best to drive away his friend's
bodings and apprehensions.
“Anything happened to her? Henry, that's pure nonsense. There isn't
anything going to happen to her; just make your mind easy as to that. What
did the letter say? Said she was well, didn't it? And said she'd be here by
nine o'clock, didn't it? Did you ever know her to fail of her word? Why, you
know you never did. Well, then, don't you fret; she'll be here, and that's
absolutely certain, and as sure as you are born. Come, now, let's get to
decorating—not much time left.”
Pretty soon Tom and Joe arrived, and then all hands set about adorning
the house with flowers. Toward nine the three miners said that as they had
brought their instruments they might as well tune up, for the boys and girls
would soon be arriving now, and hungry for a good, old-fashioned break-
down. A fiddle, a banjo, and a clarinet—these were the instruments. The trio
took their places side by side, and began to play some rattling dance-music,
and beat time with their big boots.
It was getting very close to nine. Henry was standing in the door with his
eyes directed up the road, his body swaying to the torture of his mental
distress. He had been made to drink his wife's health and safety several
times, and now Tom shouted:
“All hands stand by! One more drink, and she's here!”
Joe brought the glasses on a waiter, and served the party. I reached for
one of the two remaining glasses, but Joe growled under his breath:
“Drop that! Take the other.”

Which I did. Henry was served last. He had hardly swallowed his drink
when the clock began to strike. He listened till it finished, his face growing
pale and paler; then he said:
“Boys, I'm sick with fear. Help me—I want to lie down!”
They helped him to the sofa. He began to nestle and drowse, but
presently spoke like one talking in his sleep, and said: “Did I hear horses'
feet? Have they come?”
One of the veterans answered, close to his ear: “It was Jimmy Parish
come to say the party got delayed, but they're right up the road a piece, and
coming along. Her horse is lame, but she'll be here in half an hour.”
“Oh, I'm so thankful nothing has happened!”
He was asleep almost before the words were out of his mouth. In a
moment those handy men had his clothes off, and had tucked him into his
bed in the chamber where I had washed my hands. They closed the door
and came back. Then they seemed preparing to leave; but I said: “Please
don't go, gentlemen. She won't know me; I am a stranger.”
They glanced at each other. Then Joe said:
“She? Poor thing, she's been dead nineteen years!”
“Dead?”
“That or worse. She went to see her folks half a year after she was
married, and on her way back, on a Saturday evening, the Indians captured
her within five miles of this place, and she's never been heard of since.”
“And he lost his mind in consequence?”
“Never has been sane an hour since. But he only gets bad when that time
of year comes round. Then we begin to drop in here, three days before she's
due, to encourage him up, and ask if he's heard from her, and Saturday we
all come and fix up the house with flowers, and get everything ready for a
dance. We've done it every year for nineteen years. The first Saturday there
was twenty-seven of us, without counting the girls; there's only three of us
now, and the girls are gone. We drug him to sleep, or he would go wild;
then he's all right for another year—thinks she's with him till the last three
or four days come round; then he begins to look for her, and gets out his
poor old letter, and we come and ask him to read it to us. Lord, she was a
darling!”

A HELPLESS SITUATION
Once or twice a year I get a letter of a certain pattern, a pattern that never
materially changes, in form and substance, yet I cannot get used to that
letter—it always astonishes me. It affects me as the locomotive always
affects me: I say to myself, “I have seen you a thousand times, you always
look the same way, yet you are always a wonder, and you are always
impossible; to contrive you is clearly beyond human genius—you can't
exist, you don't exist, yet here you are!”
I have a letter of that kind by me, a very old one. I yearn to print it, and
where is the harm? The writer of it is dead years ago, no doubt, and if I
conceal her name and address—her this-world address—I am sure her
shade will not mind. And with it I wish to print the answer which I wrote at
the time but probably did not send. If it went—which is not likely—it went
in the form of a copy, for I find the original still here, pigeonholed with the
said letter. To that kind of letters we all write answers which we do not
send, fearing to hurt where we have no desire to hurt; I have done it many a
time, and this is doubtless a case of the sort.
THE LETTER
X———, California, JUNE 3, 1879.
Mr. S. L. Clemens, HARTFORD, CONN.:
Dear Sir,—You will doubtless be surprised to know who has presumed to
write and ask a favor of you. Let your memory go back to your days in the
Humboldt mines—'62-'63. You will remember, you and Clagett and Oliver
and the old blacksmith Tillou lived in a lean-to which was half-way up the
gulch, and there were six log cabins in the camp—strung pretty well
separated up the gulch from its mouth at the desert to where the last claim
was, at the divide. The lean-to you lived in was the one with a canvas roof
that the cow fell down through one night, as told about by you in Roughing
It—my uncle Simmons remembers it very well. He lived in the principal
cabin, half-way up the divide, along with Dixon and Parker and Smith. It
had two rooms, one for kitchen and the other for bunks, and was the only
one that had. You and your party were there on the great night, the time they

had dried-apple-pie, Uncle Simmons often speaks of it. It seems curious
that dried-apple-pie should have seemed such a great thing, but it was, and
it shows how far Humboldt was out of the world and difficult to get to, and
how slim the regular bill of fare was. Sixteen years ago—it is a long time. I
was a little girl then, only fourteen. I never saw you, I lived in Washoe. But
Uncle Simmons ran across you every now and then, all during those weeks
that you and party were there working your claim which was like the rest.
The camp played out long and long ago, there wasn't silver enough in it to
make a button. You never saw my husband, but he was there after you left,
and lived in that very lean-to, a bachelor then but married to me now. He
often wishes there had been a photographer there in those days, he would
have taken the lean-to. He got hurt in the old Hal Clayton claim that was
abandoned like the others, putting in a blast and not climbing out quick
enough, though he scrambled the best he could. It landed him clear down on
the train and hit a Piute. For weeks they thought he would not get over it but
he did, and is all right, now. Has been ever since. This is a long introduction
but it is the only way I can make myself known. The favor I ask I feel
assured your generous heart will grant: Give me some advice about a book I
have written. I do not claim anything for it only it is mostly true and as
interesting as most of the books of the times. I am unknown in the literary
world and you know what that means unless one has some one of influence
(like yourself) to help you by speaking a good word for you. I would like to
place the book on royalty basis plan with any one you would suggest.
This is a secret from my husband and family. I intend it as a surprise in
case I get it published.
Feeling you will take an interest in this and if possible write me a letter to
some publisher, or, better still, if you could see them for me and then let me
hear.
I appeal to you to grant me this favor. With deepest gratitude I think you
for your attention.
One knows, without inquiring, that the twin of that embarrassing letter is
forever and ever flying in this and that and the other direction across the
continent in the mails, daily, nightly, hourly, unceasingly, unrestingly. It
goes to every well-known merchant, and railway official, and manufacturer,
and capitalist, and Mayor, and Congressman, and Governor, and editor, and
publisher, and author, and broker, and banker—in a word, to every person

who is supposed to have “influence.” It always follows the one pattern:
“You do not know me, but you once knew a relative of mine,” etc., etc. We
should all like to help the applicants, we should all be glad to do it, we
should all like to return the sort of answer that is desired, but—Well, there
is not a thing we can do that would be a help, for not in any instance does
that latter ever come from anyone who can be helped. The struggler whom
you could help does his own helping; it would not occur to him to apply to
you, stranger. He has talent and knows it, and he goes into his fight eagerly
and with energy and determination—all alone, preferring to be alone. That
pathetic letter which comes to you from the incapable, the unhelpable—
how do you who are familiar with it answer it? What do you find to say?
You do not want to inflict a wound; you hunt ways to avoid that. What do
you find? How do you get out of your hard place with a content
conscience? Do you try to explain? The old reply of mine to such a letter
shows that I tried that once. Was I satisfied with the result? Possibly; and
possibly not; probably not; almost certainly not. I have long ago forgotten
all about it. But, anyway, I append my effort:
THE REPLY
I know Mr. H., and I will go to him, dear madam, if upon reflection you
find you still desire it. There will be a conversation. I know the form it will
take. It will be like this:
MR. H. How do her books strike you?
MR. CLEMENS. I am not acquainted with them.
H. Who has been her publisher?
C. I don't know.
H. She has one, I suppose?
C. I—I think not.
H. Ah. You think this is her first book?
C. Yes—I suppose so. I think so.
H. What is it about? What is the character of it?
C. I believe I do not know.
H. Have you seen it?
C. Well—no, I haven't.
H. Ah-h. How long have you known her?

C. I don't know her.
H. Don't know her?
C. No.
H. Ah-h. How did you come to be interested in her book, then?
C. Well, she—she wrote and asked me to find a publisher for her, and
mentioned you.
H. Why should she apply to you instead of me?
C. She wished me to use my influence.
H. Dear me, what has influence to do with such a matter?
C. Well, I think she thought you would be more likely to examine her
book if you were influenced.
H. Why, what we are here for is to examine books—anybody's book that
comes along. It's our business. Why should we turn away a book
unexamined because it's a stranger's? It would be foolish. No publisher does
it. On what ground did she request your influence, since you do not know
her? She must have thought you knew her literature and could speak for it.
Is that it?
C. No; she knew I didn't.
H. Well, what then? She had a reason of some sort for believing you
competent to recommend her literature, and also under obligations to do it?
C. Yes, I—I knew her uncle.
H. Knew her uncle?
C. Yes.
H. Upon my word! So, you knew her uncle; her uncle knows her
literature; he endorses it to you; the chain is complete, nothing further
needed; you are satisfied, and therefore—
C. No, that isn't all, there are other ties. I know the cabin her uncle lived
in, in the mines; I knew his partners, too; also I came near knowing her
husband before she married him, and I did know the abandoned shaft where
a premature blast went off and he went flying through the air and clear
down to the trail and hit an Indian in the back with almost fatal
consequences.
H. To him, or to the Indian?

C. She didn't say which it was.
H. (With a sigh). It certainly beats the band! You don't know her, you
don't know her literature, you don't know who got hurt when the blast went
off, you don't know a single thing for us to build an estimate of her book
upon, so far as I—
C. I knew her uncle. You are forgetting her uncle.
H. Oh, what use is he? Did you know him long? How long was it?
C. Well, I don't know that I really knew him, but I must have met him,
anyway. I think it was that way; you can't tell about these things, you know,
except when they are recent.
H. Recent? When was all this?
C. Sixteen years ago.
H. What a basis to judge a book upon! As first you said you knew him,
and now you don't know whether you did or not.
C. Oh yes, I know him; anyway, I think I thought I did; I'm perfectly
certain of it.
H. What makes you think you thought you knew him?
C. Why, she says I did, herself.
H. She says so!
C. Yes, she does, and I did know him, too, though I don't remember it
now.
H. Come—how can you know it when you don't remember it.
C. I don't know. That is, I don't know the process, but I do know lots of
things that I don't remember, and remember lots of things that I don't know.
It's so with every educated person.
H. (After a pause). Is your time valuable?
C. No—well, not very.
H. Mine is.
So I came away then, because he was looking tired. Overwork, I reckon;
I never do that; I have seen the evil effects of it. My mother was always
afraid I would overwork myself, but I never did.
Dear madam, you see how it would happen if I went there. He would ask
me those questions, and I would try to answer them to suit him, and he

would hunt me here and there and yonder and get me embarrassed more and
more all the time, and at last he would look tired on account of overwork,
and there it would end and nothing done. I wish I could be useful to you,
but, you see, they do not care for uncles or any of those things; it doesn't
move them, it doesn't have the least effect, they don't care for anything but
the literature itself, and they as good as despise influence. But they do care
for books, and are eager to get them and examine them, no matter whence
they come, nor from whose pen. If you will send yours to a publisher—any
publisher—he will certainly examine it, I can assure you of that.

A TELEPHONIC CONVERSATION
Consider that a conversation by telephone—when you are simply sitting
by and not taking any part in that conversation—is one of the solemnest
curiosities of modern life. Yesterday I was writing a deep article on a
sublime philosophical subject while such a conversation was going on in
the room. I notice that one can always write best when somebody is talking
through a telephone close by. Well, the thing began in this way. A member
of our household came in and asked me to have our house put into
communication with Mr. Bagley's downtown. I have observed, in many
cities, that the sex always shrink from calling up the central office
themselves. I don't know why, but they do. So I touched the bell, and this
talk ensued:
Central Office. (Gruffly.) Hello!
I. Is it the Central Office?
C. O. Of course it is. What do you want?
I. Will you switch me on to the Bagleys, please?
C. O. All right. Just keep your ear to the telephone.
Then I heard k-look, k-look, k'look—klook-klook-klook-look-look! then a
horrible “gritting” of teeth, and finally a piping female voice: Y-e-s? (Rising
inflection.) Did you wish to speak to me?
Without answering, I handed the telephone to the applicant, and sat
down. Then followed that queerest of all the queer things in this world—a
conversation with only one end to it. You hear questions asked; you don't
hear the answer. You hear invitations given; you hear no thanks in return.
You have listening pauses of dead silence, followed by apparently irrelevant
and unjustifiable exclamations of glad surprise or sorrow or dismay. You
can't make head or tail of the talk, because you never hear anything that the
person at the other end of the wire says. Well, I heard the following
remarkable series of observations, all from the one tongue, and all shouted
—for you can't ever persuade the sex to speak gently into a telephone:
Yes? Why, how did that happen?

Pause.
What did you say?
Pause.
Oh no, I don't think it was.
Pause.
No! Oh no, I didn't mean that. I meant, put it in while it is still boiling—
or just before it comes to a boil.
Pause.
What?
Pause.
I turned it over with a backstitch on the selvage edge.
Pause.
Yes, I like that way, too; but I think it's better to baste it on with
Valenciennes or bombazine, or something of that sort. It gives it such an air
—and attracts so much noise.
Pause.
It's forty-ninth Deuteronomy, sixty-forth to ninety-seventh inclusive. I
think we ought all to read it often.
Pause.
Perhaps so; I generally use a hair pin.
Pause.
What did you say? (_Aside_.) Children, do be quiet!
Pause
Oh! B flat! Dear me, I thought you said it was the cat!
Pause.
Since when?
Pause.
Why, I never heard of it.
Pause.
You astound me! It seems utterly impossible!
Pause.

Who did?
Pause.
Good-ness gracious!
Pause.
Well, what is this world coming to? Was it right in church?
Pause.
And was her mother there?
Pause.
Why, Mrs. Bagley, I should have died of humiliation! What did they do?
Long pause.
I can't be perfectly sure, because I haven't the notes by me; but I think it
goes something like this: te-rolly-loll-loll, loll lolly-loll-loll, O tolly-loll-
loll-lee-ly-li-i-do! And then repeat, you know.
Pause.
Yes, I think it is very sweet—and very solemn and impressive, if you get
the andantino and the pianissimo right.
Pause.
Oh, gum-drops, gum-drops! But I never allow them to eat striped candy.
And of course they can't, till they get their teeth, anyway.
Pause.
What?
Pause.
Oh, not in the least—go right on. He's here writing—it doesn't bother
him.
Pause.
Very well, I'll come if I can. (Aside.) Dear me, how it does tire a person's
arm to hold this thing up so long! I wish she'd—
Pause.
Oh no, not at all; I like to talk—but I'm afraid I'm keeping you from your
affairs.
Pause.
Visitors?

Pause.
No, we never use butter on them.
Pause.
Yes, that is a very good way; but all the cook-books say they are very
unhealthy when they are out of season. And he doesn't like them, anyway—
especially canned.
Pause.
Oh, I think that is too high for them; we have never paid over fifty cents a
bunch.
Pause.
Must you go? Well, good-by.
Pause.
Yes, I think so. good-by.
Pause.
Four o'clock, then—I'll be ready. good-by.
Pause.
Thank you ever so much. good-by.
Pause.
Oh, not at all!—just as fresh—which? Oh, I'm glad to hear you say that.
Good-by.
(Hangs up the telephone and says, “Oh, it does tire a person's arm so!”)
A man delivers a single brutal “Good-by,” and that is the end of it. Not so
with the gentle sex—I say it in their praise; they cannot abide abruptness.

EDWARD MILLS AND GEORGE BENTON: A
TALE
These two were distantly related to each other—seventh cousins, or
something of that sort. While still babies they became orphans, and were
adopted by the Brants, a childless couple, who quickly grew very fond of
them. The Brants were always saying: “Be pure, honest, sober, industrious,
and considerate of others, and success in life is assured.” The children heard
this repeated some thousands of times before they understood it; they could
repeat it themselves long before they could say the Lord's Prayer; it was
painted over the nursery door, and was about the first thing they learned to
read. It was destined to be the unswerving rule of Edward Mills's life.
Sometimes the Brants changed the wording a little, and said: “Be pure,
honest, sober, industrious, considerate, and you will never lack friends.”
Baby Mills was a comfort to everybody about him. When he wanted
candy and could not have it, he listened to reason, and contented himself
without it. When Baby Benton wanted candy, he cried for it until he got it.
Baby Mills took care of his toys; Baby Benton always destroyed his in a
very brief time, and then made himself so insistently disagreeable that, in
order to have peace in the house, little Edward was persuaded to yield up
his play-things to him.
When the children were a little older, Georgie became a heavy expense in
one respect: he took no care of his clothes; consequently, he shone
frequently in new ones, which was not the case with Eddie. The boys grew
apace. Eddie was an increasing comfort, Georgie an increasing solicitude. It
was always sufficient to say, in answer to Eddie's petitions, “I would rather
you would not do it”—meaning swimming, skating, picnicking, berrying,
circusing, and all sorts of things which boys delight in. But no answer was
sufficient for Georgie; he had to be humored in his desires, or he would
carry them with a high hand. Naturally, no boy got more swimming skating,
berrying, and so forth than he; no body ever had a better time. The good
Brants did not allow the boys to play out after nine in summer evenings;
they were sent to bed at that hour; Eddie honorably remained, but Georgie

usually slipped out of the window toward ten, and enjoyed himself until
midnight. It seemed impossible to break Georgie of this bad habit, but the
Brants managed it at last by hiring him, with apples and marbles, to stay in.
The good Brants gave all their time and attention to vain endeavors to
regulate Georgie; they said, with grateful tears in their eyes, that Eddie
needed no efforts of theirs, he was so good, so considerate, and in all ways
so perfect.
By and by the boys were big enough to work, so they were apprenticed to
a trade: Edward went voluntarily; George was coaxed and bribed. Edward
worked hard and faithfully, and ceased to be an expense to the good Brants;
they praised him, so did his master; but George ran away, and it cost Mr.
Brant both money and trouble to hunt him up and get him back. By and by
he ran away again—more money and more trouble. He ran away a third
time—and stole a few things to carry with him. Trouble and expense for Mr.
Brant once more; and, besides, it was with the greatest difficulty that he
succeeded in persuading the master to let the youth go unprosecuted for the
theft.
Edward worked steadily along, and in time became a full partner in his
master's business. George did not improve; he kept the loving hearts of his
aged benefactors full of trouble, and their hands full of inventive activities
to protect him from ruin. Edward, as a boy, had interested himself in
Sunday-schools, debating societies, penny missionary affairs, anti-tobacco
organizations, anti-profanity associations, and all such things; as a man, he
was a quiet but steady and reliable helper in the church, the temperance
societies, and in all movements looking to the aiding and uplifting of men.
This excited no remark, attracted no attention—for it was his “natural bent.”
Finally, the old people died. The will testified their loving pride in
Edward, and left their little property to George—because he “needed it”;
whereas, “owing to a bountiful Providence,” such was not the case with
Edward. The property was left to George conditionally: he must buy out
Edward's partner with it; else it must go to a benevolent organization called
the Prisoner's Friend Society. The old people left a letter, in which they
begged their dear son Edward to take their place and watch over George,
and help and shield him as they had done.
Edward dutifully acquiesced, and George became his partner in the
business. He was not a valuable partner: he had been meddling with drink

before; he soon developed into a constant tippler now, and his flesh and
eyes showed the fact unpleasantly. Edward had been courting a sweet and
kindly spirited girl for some time. They loved each other dearly, and—But
about this period George began to haunt her tearfully and imploringly, and
at last she went crying to Edward, and said her high and holy duty was plain
before her—she must not let her own selfish desires interfere with it: she
must marry “poor George” and “reform him.” It would break her heart, she
knew it would, and so on; but duty was duty. So she married George, and
Edward's heart came very near breaking, as well as her own. However,
Edward recovered, and married another girl—a very excellent one she was,
too.
Children came to both families. Mary did her honest best to reform her
husband, but the contract was too large. George went on drinking, and by
and by he fell to misusing her and the little ones sadly. A great many good
people strove with George—they were always at it, in fact—but he calmly
took such efforts as his due and their duty, and did not mend his ways. He
added a vice, presently—that of secret gambling. He got deeply in debt; he
borrowed money on the firm's credit, as quietly as he could, and carried this
system so far and so successfully that one morning the sheriff took
possession of the establishment, and the two cousins found themselves
penniless.
Times were hard, now, and they grew worse. Edward moved his family
into a garret, and walked the streets day and night, seeking work. He
begged for it, but it was really not to be had. He was astonished to see how
soon his face became unwelcome; he was astonished and hurt to see how
quickly the ancient interest which people had had in him faded out and
disappeared. Still, he must get work; so he swallowed his chagrin, and
toiled on in search of it. At last he got a job of carrying bricks up a ladder in
a hod, and was a grateful man in consequence; but after that nobody knew
him or cared anything about him. He was not able to keep up his dues in the
various moral organizations to which he belonged, and had to endure the
sharp pain of seeing himself brought under the disgrace of suspension.
But the faster Edward died out of public knowledge and interest, the
faster George rose in them. He was found lying, ragged and drunk, in the
gutter one morning. A member of the Ladies' Temperance Refuge fished

him out, took him in hand, got up a subscription for him, kept him sober a
whole week, then got a situation for him. An account of it was published.
General attention was thus drawn to the poor fellow, and a great many
people came forward and helped him toward reform with their countenance
and encouragement. He did not drink a drop for two months, and meantime
was the pet of the good. Then he fell—in the gutter; and there was general
sorrow and lamentation. But the noble sisterhood rescued him again. They
cleaned him up, they fed him, they listened to the mournful music of his
repentances, they got him his situation again. An account of this, also, was
published, and the town was drowned in happy tears over the re-restoration
of the poor beast and struggling victim of the fatal bowl. A grand
temperance revival was got up, and after some rousing speeches had been
made the chairman said, impressively: “We are not about to call for signers;
and I think there is a spectacle in store for you which not many in this house
will be able to view with dry eyes.” There was an eloquent pause, and then
George Benton, escorted by a red-sashed detachment of the Ladies of the
Refuge, stepped forward upon the platform and signed the pledge. The air
was rent with applause, and everybody cried for joy. Everybody wrung the
hand of the new convert when the meeting was over; his salary was
enlarged next day; he was the talk of the town, and its hero. An account of it
was published.
George Benton fell, regularly, every three months, but was faithfully
rescued and wrought with, every time, and good situations were found for
him. Finally, he was taken around the country lecturing, as a reformed
drunkard, and he had great houses and did an immense amount of good.
He was so popular at home, and so trusted—during his sober intervals—
that he was enabled to use the name of a principal citizen, and get a large
sum of money at the bank. A mighty pressure was brought to bear to save
him from the consequences of his forgery, and it was partially successful—
he was “sent up” for only two years. When, at the end of a year, the tireless
efforts of the benevolent were crowned with success, and he emerged from
the penitentiary with a pardon in his pocket, the Prisoner's Friend Society
met him at the door with a situation and a comfortable salary, and all the
other benevolent people came forward and gave him advice, encouragement
and help. Edward Mills had once applied to the Prisoner's Friend Society

for a situation, when in dire need, but the question, “Have you been a
prisoner?” made brief work of his case.
While all these things were going on, Edward Mills had been quietly
making head against adversity. He was still poor, but was in receipt of a
steady and sufficient salary, as the respected and trusted cashier of a bank.
George Benton never came near him, and was never heard to inquire about
him. George got to indulging in long absences from the town; there were ill
reports about him, but nothing definite.
One winter's night some masked burglars forced their way into the bank,
and found Edward Mills there alone. They commanded him to reveal the
“combination,” so that they could get into the safe. He refused. They
threatened his life. He said his employers trusted him, and he could not be
traitor to that trust. He could die, if he must, but while he lived he would be
faithful; he would not yield up the “combination.” The burglars killed him.
The detectives hunted down the criminals; the chief one proved to be
George Benton. A wide sympathy was felt for the widow and orphans of the
dead man, and all the newspapers in the land begged that all the banks in
the land would testify their appreciation of the fidelity and heroism of the
murdered cashier by coming forward with a generous contribution of
money in aid of his family, now bereft of support. The result was a mass of
solid cash amounting to upward of five hundred dollars—an average of
nearly three-eights of a cent for each bank in the Union. The cashier's own
bank testified its gratitude by endeavoring to show (but humiliatingly failed
in it) that the peerless servant's accounts were not square, and that he
himself had knocked his brains out with a bludgeon to escape detection and
punishment.
George Benton was arraigned for trial. Then everybody seemed to forget
the widow and orphans in their solicitude for poor George. Everything that
money and influence could do was done to save him, but it all failed; he
was sentenced to death. Straightway the Governor was besieged with
petitions for commutation or pardon; they were brought by tearful young
girls; by sorrowful old maids; by deputations of pathetic widows; by shoals
of impressive orphans. But no, the Governor—for once—would not yield.
Now George Benton experienced religion. The glad news flew all
around. From that time forth his cell was always full of girls and women
and fresh flowers; all the day long there was prayer, and hymn-singing, and

thanksgiving, and homilies, and tears, with never an interruption, except an
occasional five-minute intermission for refreshments.
This sort of thing continued up to the very gallows, and George Benton
went proudly home, in the black cap, before a wailing audience of the
sweetest and best that the region could produce. His grave had fresh flowers
on it every day, for a while, and the head-stone bore these words, under a
hand pointing aloft: “He has fought the good fight.”
The brave cashier's head-stone has this inscription: “Be pure, honest,
sober, industrious, considerate, and you will never—”
Nobody knows who gave the order to leave it that way, but it was so
given.
The cashier's family are in stringent circumstances, now, it is said; but no
matter; a lot of appreciative people, who were not willing that an act so
brave and true as his should go unrewarded, have collected forty-two
thousand dollars—and built a Memorial Church with it.

THE FIVE BOONS OF LIFE

Chapter I
In the morning of life came a good fairy with her basket, and said:
“Here are gifts. Take one, leave the others. And be wary, choose wisely;
oh, choose wisely! for only one of them is valuable.”
The gifts were five: Fame, Love, Riches, Pleasure, Death. The youth
said, eagerly:
“There is no need to consider”; and he chose Pleasure.
He went out into the world and sought out the pleasures that youth
delights in. But each in its turn was short-lived and disappointing, vain and
empty; and each, departing, mocked him. In the end he said: “These years I
have wasted. If I could but choose again, I would choose wisely.”

Chapter II
The fairy appeared, and said:
“Four of the gifts remain. Choose once more; and oh, remember—time is
flying, and only one of them is precious.”
The man considered long, then chose Love; and did not mark the tears
that rose in the fairy's eyes.
After many, many years the man sat by a coffin, in an empty home. And
he communed with himself, saying: “One by one they have gone away and
left me; and now she lies here, the dearest and the last. Desolation after
desolation has swept over me; for each hour of happiness the treacherous
trader, Love, has sold me I have paid a thousand hours of grief. Out of my
heart of hearts I curse him.”

Chapter III
“Choose again.” It was the fairy speaking.
“The years have taught you wisdom—surely it must be so. Three gifts
remain. Only one of them has any worth—remember it, and choose warily.”
The man reflected long, then chose Fame; and the fairy, sighing, went her
way.
Years went by and she came again, and stood behind the man where he
sat solitary in the fading day, thinking. And she knew his thought:
“My name filled the world, and its praises were on every tongue, and it
seemed well with me for a little while. How little a while it was! Then came
envy; then detraction; then calumny; then hate; then persecution. Then
derision, which is the beginning of the end. And last of all came pity, which
is the funeral of fame. Oh, the bitterness and misery of renown! target for
mud in its prime, for contempt and compassion in its decay.”

Chapter IV
“Chose yet again.” It was the fairy's voice.
“Two gifts remain. And do not despair. In the beginning there was but
one that was precious, and it is still here.”
“Wealth—which is power! How blind I was!” said the man. “Now, at
last, life will be worth the living. I will spend, squander, dazzle. These
mockers and despisers will crawl in the dirt before me, and I will feed my
hungry heart with their envy. I will have all luxuries, all joys, all
enchantments of the spirit, all contentments of the body that man holds
dear. I will buy, buy, buy! deference, respect, esteem, worship—every
pinchbeck grace of life the market of a trivial world can furnish forth. I
have lost much time, and chosen badly heretofore, but let that pass; I was
ignorant then, and could but take for best what seemed so.”
Three short years went by, and a day came when the man sat shivering in
a mean garret; and he was gaunt and wan and hollow-eyed, and clothed in
rags; and he was gnawing a dry crust and mumbling:
“Curse all the world's gifts, for mockeries and gilded lies! And miscalled,
every one. They are not gifts, but merely lendings. Pleasure, Love, Fame,
Riches: they are but temporary disguises for lasting realities—Pain, Grief,
Shame, Poverty. The fairy said true; in all her store there was but one gift
which was precious, only one that was not valueless. How poor and cheap
and mean I know those others now to be, compared with that inestimable
one, that dear and sweet and kindly one, that steeps in dreamless and
enduring sleep the pains that persecute the body, and the shames and griefs
that eat the mind and heart. Bring it! I am weary, I would rest.”

Chapter V
The fairy came, bringing again four of the gifts, but Death was wanting.
She said:
“I gave it to a mother's pet, a little child. It was ignorant, but trusted me,
asking me to choose for it. You did not ask me to choose.”
“Oh, miserable me! What is left for me?”
“What not even you have deserved: the wanton insult of Old Age.”

THE FIRST WRITING-MACHINES
From My Unpublished Autobiography
Some days ago a correspondent sent in an old typewritten sheet, faded by
age, containing the following letter over the signature of Mark Twain:
“Hartford, March 10, 1875.
“Please do not use my name in any way. Please do not even divulge
that fact that I own a machine. I have entirely stopped using the
typewriter, for the reason that I never could write a letter with it to
anybody without receiving a request by return mail that I would not
only describe the machine, but state what progress I had made in the
use of it, etc., etc. I don't like to write letters, and so I don't want
people to know I own this curiosity-breeding little joker.”

A note was sent to Mr. Clemens asking him if the letter was genuine and
whether he really had a typewriter as long ago as that. Mr. Clemens replied
that his best answer is the following chapter from his unpublished
autobiography:
1904. VILLA QUARTO, FLORENCE, JANUARY.
Dictating autobiography to a typewriter is a new experience for me,
but it goes very well, and is going to save time and “language”—the
kind of language that soothes vexation.
I have dictated to a typewriter before—but not autobiography.
Between that experience and the present one there lies a mighty gap—
more than thirty years! It is a sort of lifetime. In that wide interval
much has happened—to the type-machine as well as to the rest of us.
At the beginning of that interval a type-machine was a curiosity. The
person who owned one was a curiosity, too. But now it is the other
way about: the person who doesn't own one is a curiosity. I saw a type-
machine for the first time in—what year? I suppose it was 1873—
because Nasby was with me at the time, and it was in Boston. We must
have been lecturing, or we could not have been in Boston, I take it. I
quitted the platform that season.
But never mind about that, it is no matter. Nasby and I saw the
machine through a window, and went in to look at it. The salesman
explained it to us, showed us samples of its work, and said it could do
fifty-seven words a minute—a statement which we frankly confessed
that we did not believe. So he put his type-girl to work, and we timed
her by the watch. She actually did the fifty-seven in sixty seconds. We
were partly convinced, but said it probably couldn't happen again. But
it did. We timed the girl over and over again—with the same result

always: she won out. She did her work on narrow slips of paper, and
we pocketed them as fast as she turned them out, to show as
curiosities. The price of the machine was one hundred and twenty-five
dollars. I bought one, and we went away very much excited.
At the hotel we got out our slips and were a little disappointed to
find that they contained the same words. The girl had economized time
and labor by using a formula which she knew by heart. However, we
argued—safely enough—that the first type-girl must naturally take
rank with the first billiard-player: neither of them could be expected to
get out of the game any more than a third or a half of what was in it. If
the machine survived—_if_ it survived—experts would come to the
front, by and by, who would double the girl's output without a doubt.
They would do one hundred words a minute—my talking speed on the
platform. That score has long ago been beaten.
At home I played with the toy, repeating and repeating and repeating
“The Boy stood on the Burning Deck,” until I could turn that boy's
adventure out at the rate of twelve words a minute; then I resumed the
pen, for business, and only worked the machine to astonish inquiring
visitors. They carried off many reams of the boy and his burning deck.
By and by I hired a young woman, and did my first dictating
(letters, merely), and my last until now. The machine did not do both
capitals and lower case (as now), but only capitals. Gothic capitals
they were, and sufficiently ugly. I remember the first letter I dictated, it
was to Edward Bok, who was a boy then. I was not acquainted with
him at that time. His present enterprising spirit is not new—he had it in
that early day. He was accumulating autographs, and was not content
with mere signatures, he wanted a whole autograph letter. I furnished
it—in type-written capitals, signature and all. It was long; it was a
sermon; it contained advice; also reproaches. I said writing was my
trade, my bread-and-butter; I said it was not fair to ask a man to give
away samples of his trade; would he ask the blacksmith for a
horseshoe? would he ask the doctor for a corpse?
Now I come to an important matter—as I regard it. In the year '74
the young woman copied a considerable part of a book of mine on the
machine. In a previous chapter of this Autobiography I have claimed
that I was the first person in the world that ever had a telephone in the
house for practical purposes; I will now claim—until dispossessed—
that I was the first person in the world to apply the type-machine to
literature. That book must have been The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer. I
wrote the first half of it in '72, the rest of it in '74. My machinist type-
copied a book for me in '74, so I concluded it was that one.
That early machine was full of caprices, full of defects—devilish
ones. It had as many immoralities as the machine of today has virtues.
After a year or two I found that it was degrading my character, so I
thought I would give it to Howells. He was reluctant, for he was
suspicious of novelties and unfriendly toward them, and he remains so
to this day. But I persuaded him. He had great confidence in me, and I
got him to believe things about the machine that I did not believe

myself. He took it home to Boston, and my morals began to improve,
but his have never recovered.
He kept it six months, and then returned it to me. I gave it away
twice after that, but it wouldn't stay; it came back. Then I gave it to our
coachman, Patrick McAleer, who was very grateful, because he did not
know the animal, and thought I was trying to make him wiser and
better. As soon as he got wiser and better he traded it to a heretic for a
side-saddle which he could not use, and there my knowledge of its
history ends.

ITALIAN WITHOUT A MASTER
It is almost a fortnight now that I am domiciled in a medieval villa in the
country, a mile or two from Florence. I cannot speak the language; I am too
old now to learn how, also too busy when I am busy, and too indolent when
I am not; wherefore some will imagine that I am having a dull time of it.
But it is not so. The “help” are all natives; they talk Italian to me, I answer
in English; I do not understand them, they do not understand me,
consequently no harm is done, and everybody is satisfied.
In order to be just and fair, I throw in an Italian word
when I have one, and this has a good influence. I get the
word out of the morning paper. I have to use it while it is
fresh, for I find that Italian words do not keep in this
climate. They fade toward night, and next morning they are
gone. But it is no matter; I get a new one out of the paper
before breakfast, and thrill the domestics with it while it
lasts. I have no dictionary, and I do not want one; I can
select words by the sound, or by orthographic aspect. Many
of them have French or German or English look, and these
are the ones I enslave for the day's service. That is, as a
rule. Not always. If I find a learnable phrase that has an
imposing look and warbles musically along I do not care to know the
meaning of it; I pay it out to the first applicant, knowing that if I pronounce
it carefully he will understand it, and that's enough.
Yesterday's word was avanti. It sounds Shakespearian, and probably
means Avaunt and quit my sight. Today I have a whole phrase: sono
dispiacentissimo. I do not know what it means, but it seems to fit in
everywhere and give satisfaction. Although as a rule my words and phrases
are good for one day and train only, I have several that stay by me all the
time, for some unknown reason, and these come very handy when I get into
a long conversation and need things to fire up with in monotonous stretches.
One of the best ones is dov `e il gatto. It nearly always produces a pleasant
surprise, therefore I save it up for places where I want to express applause

or admiration. The fourth word has a French sound, and I
think the phrase means “that takes the cake.”
During my first week in the deep and dreamy stillness of
this woodsy and flowery place I was without news of the
outside world, and was well content without it. It had been
four weeks since I had seen a newspaper, and this lack
seemed to give life a new charm and grace, and to saturate
it with a feeling verging upon actual delight. Then came a
change that was to be expected: the appetite for news began
to rise again, after this invigorating rest. I had to feed it, but
I was not willing to let it make me its helpless slave again; I
determined to put it on a diet, and a strict and limited one.
So I examined an Italian paper, with the idea of feeding it on that, and on
that exclusively. On that exclusively, and without help of a dictionary. In
this way I should surely be well protected against overloading and
indigestion.
A glance at the telegraphic page filled me with encouragement. There
were no scare-heads. That was good—supremely good. But there were
headings—one-liners and two-liners—and that was good too; for without
these, one must do as one does with a German paper—pay out precious
time in finding out what an article is about, only to discover, in many cases,
that there is nothing in it of interest to you. The headline is a valuable thing.
Necessarily we are all fond of murders, scandals, swindles, robberies,
explosions, collisions, and all such things, when we know the people, and
when they are neighbors and friends, but when they are strangers we do not
get any great pleasure out of them, as a rule. Now the trouble with an
American paper is that it has no discrimination; it rakes the whole earth for
blood and garbage, and the result is that you are daily overfed and suffer a
surfeit. By habit you stow this muck every day, but you come by and by to
take no vital interest in it—indeed, you almost get tired of it. As a rule,
forty-nine-fiftieths of it concerns strangers only—people away off yonder, a
thousand miles, two thousand miles, ten thousand miles from where you
are. Why, when you come to think of it, who cares what becomes of those
people? I would not give the assassination of one personal friend for a
whole massacre of those others. And, to my mind, one relative or neighbor

mixed up in a scandal is more interesting than a whole Sodom and
Gomorrah of outlanders gone rotten. Give me the home product every time.
Very well. I saw at a glance that the Florentine paper would suit me: five
out of six of its scandals and tragedies were local; they were adventures of
one's very neighbors, one might almost say one's friends. In the matter of
world news there was not too much, but just about enough. I subscribed. I
have had no occasion to regret it. Every morning I get all the news I need
for the day; sometimes from the headlines, sometimes from the text. I have
never had to call for a dictionary yet. I read the paper with ease. Often I do
not quite understand, often some of the details escape me, but no matter, I
get the idea. I will cut out a passage or two, then you see how limpid the
language is:

Il ritorno dei Beati d'Italia
Elargizione del Re all' Ospedale italiano
The first line means that the Italian sovereigns are coming back—they
have been to England. The second line seems to mean that they enlarged the
King at the Italian hospital. With a banquet, I suppose. An English banquet
has that effect. Further:

Il ritorno dei Sovrani
a Roma
ROMA, 24, ore 22,50.—I Sovrani e le Principessine Reali si attendono a
Roma domani alle ore 15,51.
Return of the sovereigns to Rome, you see. Date of the telegram, Rome,
November 24, ten minutes before twenty-three o'clock. The telegram seems
to say, “The Sovereigns and the Royal Children expect themselves at Rome
tomorrow at fifty-one minutes after fifteen o'clock.”

I do not know about Italian time, but I judge it begins at midnight and
runs through the twenty-four hours without breaking bulk. In the following
ad, the theaters open at half-past twenty. If these are not matinees, 20.30
must mean 8.30 P.M., by my reckoning.

Spettacolli del di 25

TEATRO DELLA PERGOLA—(Ore 20,30)—Opera. Boheme.
TEATRO ALFIERI.—Compagnia drammatica Drago—(Ore 20,30)
—La Legge.
ALHAMBRA—(Ore 20,30)—Spettacolo variato.
SALA EDISON—Grandioso spettacolo Cinematografico: Quo-
Vadis?—Inaugurazione della Chiesa Russa — In coda al Direttissimo
— Vedute di Firenze con gran movimeno — America: Transporto
tronchi giganteschi — I ladri in casa del Diavolo — Scene comiche.
CINEMATOGRAFO — Via Brunelleschi n. 4.—Programma
straordinario, Don Chisciotte — Prezzi populari.

The whole of that is intelligible to me—and sane and rational, too—
except the remark about the Inauguration of a Russian Cheese. That one
oversizes my hand. Gimme me five cards.
This is a four-page paper; and as it is set in long primer leaded and has a
page of advertisements, there is no room for the crimes, disasters, and
general sweepings of the outside world—thanks be! Today I find only a
single importation of the off-color sort:

Una Principessa
che fugge con un cocchiere
PARIGI, 24.—Il MATIN ha da Berlino che la principessa
Schovenbare-Waldenbure scomparve il 9 novembre. Sarebbe partita
col suo cocchiere.
La Principassa ha 27 anni.

Twenty-seven years old, and scomparve—scampered—on the 9th
November. You see by the added detail that she departed with her
coachman. I hope Sarebbe has not made a mistake, but I am afraid the
chances are that she has. Sono dispiacentissimo.

There are several fires: also a couple of accidents. This is one of them:

Grave Disgrazia Sul Ponte Vecchio
Stammattina, circe le 7,30, mentre Giuseppe Sciatti, di anni 55, di
Casellina e Torri, passava dal Ponte Vecchio, stando seduto sopra un
barroccio carico di verdura, perse l' equilibrio e cadde al suolo,
rimanendo con la gamba destra sotto una ruota del veicolo.
Lo Sciatti fu subito raccolto da alcuni cittadini, che, per mezzo della
pubblica vettura n. 365, lo transporto a San Giovanni di Dio.
Ivi il medico di guardia gli riscontro la frattura della gamba destra e
alcune lievi escoriazioni giudicandolo guaribile in 50 giorni salvo
complicazioni.

What it seems to say is this: “Serious Disgrace on the Old Old Bridge.
This morning about 7.30, Mr. Joseph Sciatti, aged 55, of Casellina and
Torri, while standing up in a sitting posture on top of a carico barrow of
vedure (foliage? hay? vegetables?), lost his equilibrium and fell on himself,
arriving with his left leg under one of the wheels of the vehicle.
“Said Sciatti was suddenly harvested (gathered in?) by several citizens,
who by means of public cab No. 365 transported him to St. John of God.”
Paragraph No. 3 is a little obscure, but I think it says that the medico set
the broken left leg—right enough, since there was nothing the matter with
the other one—and that several are encouraged to hope that fifty days well
fetch him around in quite giudicandolo-guaribile way, if no complications
intervene.
I am sure I hope so myself.
There is a great and peculiar charm about reading news-scraps in a
language which you are not acquainted with—the charm that always goes
with the mysterious and the uncertain. You can never be absolutely sure of
the meaning of anything you read in such circumstances; you are chasing an
alert and gamy riddle all the time, and the baffling turns and dodges of the
prey make the life of the hunt. A dictionary would spoil it. Sometimes a
single word of doubtful purport will cast a veil of dreamy and golden
uncertainty over a whole paragraph of cold and practical certainties, and
leave steeped in a haunting and adorable mystery an incident which had
been vulgar and commonplace but for that benefaction. Would you be wise
to draw a dictionary on that gracious word? would you be properly
grateful?
After a couple of days' rest I now come back to my subject and seek a
case in point. I find it without trouble, in the morning paper; a cablegram
from Chicago and Indiana by way of Paris. All the words save one are
guessable by a person ignorant of Italian:

Revolverate in teatro
PARIGI, 27.—La PATRIE ha da Chicago:
Il guardiano del teatro dell'opera di Walace (Indiana), avendo voluto
espellare uno spettatore che continuava a fumare malgrado il diviety,
questo spalleggiato dai suoi amici tir`o diversi colpi di rivoltella. Il
guardiano ripose. Nacque una scarica generale. Grande panico tra gli
spettatori. Nessun ferito.

Translation.—“Revolveration in Theater. Paris, 27th. La Patrie has from
Chicago: The cop of the theater of the opera of Wallace, Indiana, had willed
to expel a spectator which continued to smoke in spite of the prohibition,
who, spalleggiato by his friends, tire (Fr. Tire, Anglice Pulled) manifold
revolver-shots; great panic among the spectators. Nobody hurt.”

It is bettable that that harmless cataclysm in the theater of the opera of
Wallace, Indiana, excited not a person in Europe but me, and so came near
to not being worth cabling to Florence by way of France. But it does excite
me. It excites me because I cannot make out, for sure, what it was that
moved the spectator to resist the officer. I was gliding along smoothly and
without obstruction or accident, until I came to that word “spalleggiato,”
then the bottom fell out. You notice what a rich gloom, what a somber and
pervading mystery, that word sheds all over the whole Wallachian tragedy.
That is the charm of the thing, that is the delight of it. This is where you
begin, this is where you revel. You can guess and guess, and have all the fun
you like; you need not be afraid there will be an end to it; none is possible,
for no amount of guessing will ever furnish you a meaning for that word
that you can be sure is the right one. All the other words give you hints, by
their form, their sound, or their spelling—this one doesn't, this one throws
out no hints, this one keeps its secret. If there is even the slightest slight
shadow of a hint anywhere, it lies in the very meagerly suggestive fact that
“spalleggiato” carries our word “egg” in its stomach. Well, make the most
out of it, and then where are you at? You conjecture that the spectator which
was smoking in spite of the prohibition and become reprohibited by the
guardians, was “egged on” by his friends, and that was owing to that evil
influence that he initiated the revolveration in theater that has galloped
under the sea and come crashing through the European press without
exciting anybody but me. But are you sure, are you dead sure, that that was

the way of it? No. Then the uncertainty remains, the mystery abides, and
with it the charm. Guess again.
If I had a phrase-book of a really satisfactory sort I would study it, and
not give all my free time to undictionarial readings, but there is no such
work on the market. The existing phrase-books are inadequate. They are
well enough as far as they go, but when you fall down and skin your leg
they don't tell you what to say.

ITALIAN WITH GRAMMAR
I found that a person of large intelligence could read this beautiful
language with considerable facility without a dictionary, but I presently
found that to such a person a grammar could be of use at times. It is
because, if he does not know the were's and the was's and the maybe's and
the has-beens's apart, confusions and uncertainties can arise. He can get the
idea that a thing is going to happen next week when the truth is that it has
already happened week before last. Even more previously, sometimes.
Examination and inquiry showed me that the adjectives and such things
were frank and fair-minded and straightforward, and did not shuffle; it was
the Verb that mixed the hands, it was the Verb that lacked stability, it was
the Verb that had no permanent opinion about anything, it was the Verb that
was always dodging the issue and putting out the light and making all the
trouble.
Further examination, further inquiry, further reflection, confirmed this
judgment, and established beyond peradventure the fact that the Verb was
the storm-center. This discovery made plain the right and wise course to
pursue in order to acquire certainty and exactness in understanding the
statements which the newspaper was daily endeavoring to convey to me: I
must catch a Verb and tame it. I must find out its ways, I must spot its
eccentricities, I must penetrate its disguises, I must intelligently foresee and
forecast at least the commoner of the dodges it was likely to try upon a
stranger in given circumstances, I must get in on its main shifts and head
them off, I must learn its game and play the limit.
I had noticed, in other foreign languages, that verbs are bred in families,
and that the members of each family have certain features or resemblances
that are common to that family and distinguish it from the other families—
the other kin, the cousins and what not. I had noticed that this family-mark
is not usually the nose or the hair, so to speak, but the tail—the Termination
—and that these tails are quite definitely differentiated; insomuch that an
expert can tell a Pluperfect from a Subjunctive by its tail as easily and as
certainly as a cowboy can tell a cow from a horse by the like process, the
result of observation and culture. I should explain that I am speaking of

legitimate verbs, those verbs which in the slang of the grammar are called
Regular. There are others—I am not meaning to conceal this; others called
Irregulars, born out of wedlock, of unknown and uninteresting parentage,
and naturally destitute of family resemblances, as regards to all features,
tails included. But of these pathetic outcasts I have nothing to say. I do not
approve of them, I do not encourage them; I am prudishly delicate and
sensitive, and I do not allow them to be used in my presence.
But, as I have said, I decided to catch one of the others and break it into
harness. One is enough. Once familiar with its assortment of tails, you are
immune; after that, no regular verb can conceal its specialty from you and
make you think it is working the past or the future or the conditional or the
unconditional when it is engaged in some other line of business—its tail
will give it away. I found out all these things by myself, without a teacher.
I selected the verb amare, to love. Not for any personal reason, for I am
indifferent about verbs; I care no more for one verb than for another, and
have little or no respect for any of them; but in foreign languages you
always begin with that one. Why, I don't know. It is merely habit, I suppose;
the first teacher chose it, Adam was satisfied, and there hasn't been a
successor since with originality enough to start a fresh one. For they are a
pretty limited lot, you will admit that? Originality is not in their line; they
can't think up anything new, anything to freshen up the old moss-grown
dullness of the language lesson and put life and “go” into it, and charm and
grace and picturesqueness.
I knew I must look after those details myself; therefore I thought them
out and wrote them down, and sent for the facchino and explained them to
him, and said he must arrange a proper plant, and get together a good stock
company among the contadini, and design the costumes, and distribute the
parts; and drill the troupe, and be ready in three days to begin on this Verb
in a shipshape and workman-like manner. I told him to put each grand
division of it under a foreman, and each subdivision under a subordinate of
the rank of sergeant or corporal or something like that, and to have a
different uniform for each squad, so that I could tell a Pluperfect from a
Compound Future without looking at the book; the whole battery to be
under his own special and particular command, with the rank of Brigadier,
and I to pay the freight.

I then inquired into the character and possibilities of the selected verb,
and was much disturbed to find that it was over my size, it being chambered
for fifty-seven rounds—fifty-seven ways of saying I love without reloading;
and yet none of them likely to convince a girl that was laying for a title, or a
title that was laying for rocks.
It seemed to me that with my inexperience it would be foolish to go into
action with this mitrailleuse, so I ordered it to the rear and told the facchino
to provide something a little more primitive to start with, something less
elaborate, some gentle old-fashioned flint-lock, smooth-bore, double-
barreled thing, calculated to cripple at two hundred yards and kill at forty—
an arrangement suitable for a beginner who could be satisfied with
moderate results on the offstart and did not wish to take the whole territory
in the first campaign.
But in vain. He was not able to mend the matter, all the verbs being of the
same build, all Gatlings, all of the same caliber and delivery, fifty-seven to
the volley, and fatal at a mile and a half. But he said the auxiliary verb
avere, to have, was a tidy thing, and easy to handle in a seaway, and less
likely to miss stays in going about than some of the others; so, upon his
recommendation I chose that one, and told him to take it along and scrape
its bottom and break out its spinnaker and get it ready for business.
I will explain that a facchino is a general-utility domestic. Mine was a
horse-doctor in his better days, and a very good one.
At the end of three days the facchino-doctor-brigadier was ready. I was
also ready, with a stenographer. We were in a room called the Rope-Walk.
This is a formidably long room, as is indicated by its facetious name, and is
a good place for reviews. At 9:30 the F.-D.-B. took his place near me and
gave the word of command; the drums began to rumble and thunder, the
head of the forces appeared at an upper door, and the “march-past” was on.
Down they filed, a blaze of variegated color, each squad gaudy in a uniform
of its own and bearing a banner inscribed with its verbal rank and quality:
first the Present Tense in Mediterranean blue and old gold, then the Past
Definite in scarlet and black, then the Imperfect in green and yellow, then
the Indicative Future in the stars and stripes, then the Old Red Sandstone
Subjunctive in purple and silver—and so on and so on, fifty-seven privates
and twenty commissioned and non-commissioned officers; certainly one of

the most fiery and dazzling and eloquent sights I have ever beheld. I could
not keep back the tears. Presently:
“Halt!” commanded the Brigadier.
“Front—face!”
“Right dress!”
“Stand at ease!”
“One—two—three. In unison—recite!”
It was fine. In one noble volume of sound of all the fifty-seven Haves in
the Italian language burst forth in an exalting and splendid confusion. Then
came commands:
“About—face! Eyes—front! Helm alee—hard aport! Forward—march!”
and the drums let go again.
When the last Termination had disappeared, the commander said the
instruction drill would now begin, and asked for suggestions. I said:
“They say I have, thou hast, he has, and so on, but they don't say what. It
will be better, and more definite, if they have something to have; just an
object, you know, a something—anything will do; anything that will give
the listener a sort of personal as well as grammatical interest in their joys
and complaints, you see.”
He said:
“It is a good point. Would a dog do?”
I said I did not know, but we could try a dog and see. So he sent out an
aide-de-camp to give the order to add the dog.
The six privates of the Present Tense now filed in, in charge of Sergeant
Avere (to have), and displaying their banner. They formed in line of battle,
and recited, one at a time, thus:
“Io ho un cane, I have a dog.”
“Tu hai un cane, thou hast a dog.”
“Egli ha un cane, he has a dog.”
“Noi abbiamo un cane, we have a dog.”
“Voi avete un cane, you have a dog.”
“Eglino hanno un cane, they have a dog.”

No comment followed. They returned to camp, and I reflected a while.
The commander said:
“I fear you are disappointed.”
“Yes,” I said; “they are too monotonous, too singsong, to dead-and-alive;
they have no expression, no elocution. It isn't natural; it could never happen
in real life. A person who had just acquired a dog is either blame' glad or
blame' sorry. He is not on the fence. I never saw a case. What the nation do
you suppose is the matter with these people?”
He thought maybe the trouble was with the dog. He said:
“These are contadini, you know, and they have a prejudice against dogs
—that is, against marimane. Marimana dogs stand guard over people's vines
and olives, you know, and are very savage, and thereby a grief and an
inconvenience to persons who want other people's things at night. In my
judgment they have taken this dog for a marimana, and have soured on
him.”
I saw that the dog was a mistake, and not functionable: we must try
something else; something, if possible, that could evoke sentiment, interest,
feeling.
“What is cat, in Italian?” I asked.
“Gatto.”
“Is it a gentleman cat, or a lady?”
“Gentleman cat.”
“How are these people as regards that animal?”
“We-ll, they—they—”
“You hesitate: that is enough. How are they about chickens?”
He tilted his eyes toward heaven in mute ecstasy. I understood.
“What is chicken, in Italian?” I asked.
“Pollo, Podere.” (Podere is Italian for master. It is a title of courtesy, and
conveys reverence and admiration.) “Pollo is one chicken by itself; when
there are enough present to constitute a plural, it is polli.”
“Very well, polli will do. Which squad is detailed for duty next?”
“The Past Definite.”

“Send out and order it to the front—with chickens. And let them
understand that we don't want any more of this cold indifference.”
He gave the order to an aide, adding, with a haunting tenderness in his
tone and a watering mouth in his aspect:
“Convey to them the conception that these are unprotected chickens.” He
turned to me, saluting with his hand to his temple, and explained, “It will
inflame their interest in the poultry, sire.”
A few minutes elapsed. Then the squad marched in and formed up, their
faces glowing with enthusiasm, and the file-leader shouted:
“Ebbi polli, I had chickens!”
“Good!” I said. “Go on, the next.”
“Avest polli, thou hadst chickens!”
“Fine! Next!”
“Ebbe polli, he had chickens!”
“Moltimoltissimo! Go on, the next!”
“Avemmo polli, we had chickens!”
“Basta-basta aspettatto avanti—last man—charge!”
“Ebbero polli, they had chickens!”
Then they formed in echelon, by columns of fours, refused the left, and
retired in great style on the double-quick. I was enchanted, and said:
“Now, doctor, that is something like! Chickens are the ticket, there is no
doubt about it. What is the next squad?”
“The Imperfect.”
“How does it go?”
“Io Aveva, I had, tu avevi, thou hadst, egli aveva, he had, noi av—”
“Wait—we've just had the hads. What are you giving me?”
“But this is another breed.”
“What do we want of another breed? Isn't one breed enough? Had is had,
and your tricking it out in a fresh way of spelling isn't going to make it any
hadder than it was before; now you know that yourself.”
“But there is a distinction—they are not just the same Hads.”
“How do you make it out?”

“Well, you use that first Had when you are referring to something that
happened at a named and sharp and perfectly definite moment; you use the
other when the thing happened at a vaguely defined time and in a more
prolonged and indefinitely continuous way.”
“Why, doctor, it is pure nonsense; you know it yourself. Look here: If I
have had a had, or have wanted to have had a had, or was in a position right
then and there to have had a had that hadn't had any chance to go out
hadding on account of this foolish discrimination which lets one Had go
hadding in any kind of indefinite grammatical weather but restricts the other
one to definite and datable meteoric convulsions, and keeps it pining around
and watching the barometer all the time, and liable to get sick through
confinement and lack of exercise, and all that sort of thing, why—why, the
inhumanity of it is enough, let alone the wanton superfluity and uselessness
of any such a loafing consumptive hospital-bird of a Had taking up room
and cumbering the place for nothing. These finical refinements revolt me; it
is not right, it is not honorable; it is constructive nepotism to keep in office
a Had that is so delicate it can't come out when the wind's in the nor'west—I
won't have this dude on the payroll. Cancel his exequator; and look here—”
“But you miss the point. It is like this. You see—”
“Never mind explaining, I don't care anything about it. Six Hads is
enough for me; anybody that needs twelve, let him subscribe; I don't want
any stock in a Had Trust. Knock out the Prolonged and Indefinitely
Continuous; four-fifths of it is water, anyway.”
“But I beg you, podere! It is often quite indispensable in cases where—”
“Pipe the next squad to the assault!”
But it was not to be; for at that moment the dull boom of the noon gun
floated up out of far-off Florence, followed by the usual softened jangle of
church-bells, Florentine and suburban, that bursts out in murmurous
response; by labor-union law the colazione (1) must stop; stop promptly,
stop instantly, stop definitely, like the chosen and best of the breed of Hads.
1. Colazione is Italian for a collection, a meeting, a seance, a sitting.—
M.T.

A BURLESQUE BIOGRAPHY
Two or three persons having at different times intimated that if I would
write an autobiography they would read it when they got leisure, I yield at
last to this frenzied public demand and herewith tender my history.
Ours is a noble house, and stretches a long way back into antiquity. The
earliest ancestor the Twains have any record of was a friend of the family
by the name of Higgins. This was in the eleventh century, when our people
were living in Aberdeen, county of Cork, England. Why it is that our long
line has ever since borne the maternal name (except when one of them now
and then took a playful refuge in an alias to avert foolishness), instead of
Higgins, is a mystery which none of us has ever felt much desire to stir. It is
a kind of vague, pretty romance, and we leave it alone. All the old families
do that way.
Arthour Twain was a man of considerable note—a solicitor on the
highway in William Rufus's time. At about the age of thirty he went to one
of those fine old English places of resort called Newgate, to see about
something, and never returned again. While there he died suddenly.
Augustus Twain seems to have made something of a stir about the year
1160. He was as full of fun as he could be, and used to take his old saber
and sharpen it up, and get in a convenient place on a dark night, and stick it
through people as they went by, to see them jump. He was a born humorist.
But he got to going too far with it; and the first time he
was found stripping one of these parties, the authorities
removed one end of him, and put it up on a nice high place
on Temple Bar, where it could contemplate the people and
have a good time. He never liked any situation so much or
stuck to it so long.
Then for the next two hundred years the family tree
shows a succession of soldiers—noble, high-spirited fellows, who always
went into battle singing, right behind the army, and always went out a-
whooping, right ahead of it.

This is a scathing rebuke to old dead Froissart's poor witticism that our
family tree never had but one limb to it, and that that one stuck out at right
angles, and bore fruit winter and summer.
Early in the fifteenth century we have Beau Twain, called “the Scholar.”
He wrote a beautiful, beautiful hand. And he could imitate anybody's hand
so closely that it was enough to make a person laugh his head off to see it.
He had infinite sport with his talent. But by and by he took a contract to
break stone for a road, and the roughness of the work spoiled his hand. Still,
he enjoyed life all the time he was in the stone business, which, with
inconsiderable intervals, was some forty-two years. In fact, he died in
harness. During all those long years he gave such satisfaction that he never
was through with one contract a week till the government gave him another.
He was a perfect pet. And he was always a favorite with his fellow-artists,
and was a conspicuous member of their benevolent secret society, called the
Chain Gang. He always wore his hair short, had a preference for striped
clothes, and died lamented by the government. He was a sore loss to his
country. For he was so regular.
Some years later we have the illustrious John Morgan Twain. He came
over to this country with Columbus in 1492 as a passenger. He appears to
have been of a crusty, uncomfortable disposition. He complained of the
food all the way over, and was always threatening to go ashore unless there
was a change. He wanted fresh shad. Hardly a day passed over his head that
he did not go idling about the ship with his nose in the air, sneering about
the commander, and saying he did not believe Columbus knew where he
was going to or had ever been there before. The memorable cry of “Land
ho!” thrilled every heart in the ship but his. He gazed awhile through a
piece of smoked glass at the penciled line lying on the distant water, and
then said: “Land be hanged—it's a raft!”
When this questionable passenger came on board the ship, he brought
nothing with him but an old newspaper containing a handkerchief marked
“B. G.,” one cotton sock marked “L. W. C.,” one woolen one marked “D.
F.,” and a night-shirt marked “O. M. R.” And yet during the voyage he
worried more about his “trunk,” and gave himself more airs about it, than
all the rest of the passengers put together. If the ship was “down by the
head,” and would not steer, he would go and move his “trunk” further aft,
and then watch the effect. If the ship was “by the stern,” he would suggest

to Columbus to detail some men to “shift that baggage.” In storms he had to
be gagged, because his wailings about his “trunk” made it impossible for
the men to hear the orders. The man does not appear to have been openly
charged with any gravely unbecoming thing, but it is noted in the ship's log
as a “curious circumstance” that albeit he brought his baggage on board the
ship in a newspaper, he took it ashore in four trunks, a queensware crate,
and a couple of champagne baskets. But when he came back insinuating, in
an insolent, swaggering way, that some of this things were missing, and was
going to search the other passengers' baggage, it was too much, and they
threw him overboard. They watched long and wonderingly for him to come
up, but not even a bubble rose on the quietly ebbing tide. But while every
one was most absorbed in gazing over the side, and the interest was
momentarily increasing, it was observed with consternation that the vessel
was adrift and the anchor-cable hanging limp from the bow. Then in the
ship's dimmed and ancient log we find this quaint note:
“In time it was discouvered yt ye troblesome passenger hadde gone
downe and got ye anchor, and toke ye same and solde it to ye dam sauvages
from ye interior, saying yt he hadde founde it, ye sonne of a ghun!”
Yet this ancestor had good and noble instincts, and it is with pride that we
call to mind the fact that he was the first white person who ever interested
himself in the work of elevating and civilizing our Indians. He built a
commodious jail and put up a gallows, and to his dying day he claimed with
satisfaction that he had had a more restraining and elevating influence on
the Indians than any other reformer that ever labored among them. At this
point the chronicle becomes less frank and chatty, and closes abruptly by
saying that the old voyager went to see his gallows perform on the first
white man ever hanged in America, and while there received injuries which
terminated in his death.
The great-grandson of the “Reformer” flourished in sixteen hundred and
something, and was known in our annals as “the old Admiral,” though in
history he had other titles. He was long in command of fleets of swift
vessels, well armed and manned, and did great service in hurrying up
merchantmen. Vessels which he followed and kept his eagle eye on, always
made good fair time across the ocean. But if a ship still loitered in spite of
all he could do, his indignation would grow till he could contain himself no
longer—and then he would take that ship home where he lived and keep it

there carefully, expecting the owners to come for it, but they never did. And
he would try to get the idleness and sloth out of the sailors of that ship by
compelling them to take invigorating exercise and a bath. He called it
“walking a plank.” All the pupils liked it. At any rate, they never found any
fault with it after trying it. When the owners were late coming for their
ships, the Admiral always burned them, so that the insurance money should
not be lost. At last this fine old tar was cut down in the fullness of his years
and honors. And to her dying day, his poor heart-broken widow believed
that if he had been cut down fifteen minutes sooner he might have been
resuscitated.
Charles Henry Twain lived during the latter part of the seventeenth
century, and was a zealous and distinguished missionary. He converted
sixteen thousand South Sea islanders, and taught them that a dog-tooth
necklace and a pair of spectacles was not enough clothing to come to divine
service in. His poor flock loved him very, very dearly; and when his funeral
was over, they got up in a body (and came out of the restaurant) with tears
in their eyes, and saying, one to another, that he was a good tender
missionary, and they wished they had some more of him.
Pah-go-to-wah-wah-pukketekeewis (Mighty-Hunter-with-a-Hog-Eye-
Twain) adorned the middle of the eighteenth century, and aided General
Braddock with all his heart to resist the oppressor Washington. It was this
ancestor who fired seventeen times at our Washington from behind a tree.
So far the beautiful romantic narrative in the moral story-books is correct;
but when that narrative goes on to say that at the seventeenth round the
awe-stricken savage said solemnly that that man was being reserved by the
Great Spirit for some mighty mission, and he dared not lift his sacrilegious
rifle against him again, the narrative seriously impairs the integrity of
history. What he did say was:
“It ain't no (hic) no use. 'At man's so drunk he can't stan' still long enough
for a man to hit him. I (hic) I can't 'ford to fool away any more am'nition on
him.”
That was why he stopped at the seventeenth round, and it was a good,
plain, matter-of-fact reason, too, and one that easily commends itself to us
by the eloquent, persuasive flavor of probability there is about it.
I also enjoyed the story-book narrative, but I felt a marring misgiving that
every Indian at Braddock's Defeat who fired at a soldier a couple of times

(two easily grows to seventeen in a century), and missed him, jumped to the
conclusion that the Great Spirit was reserving that soldier for some grand
mission; and so I somehow feared that the only reason why Washington's
case is remembered and the others forgotten is, that in his the prophecy
came true, and in that of the others it didn't. There are not books enough on
earth to contain the record of the prophecies Indians and other unauthorized
parties have made; but one may carry in his overcoat pockets the record of
all the prophecies that have been fulfilled.
I will remark here, in passing, that certain ancestors of mine are so
thoroughly well-known in history by their aliases, that I have not felt it to
be worth while to dwell upon them, or even mention them in the order of
their birth. Among these may be mentioned Richard Brinsley Twain, alias
Guy Fawkes; John Wentworth Twain, alias Sixteen-String Jack; William
Hogarth Twain, alias Jack Sheppard; Ananias Twain, alias Baron
Munchausen; John George Twain, alias Captain Kydd; and then there are
George Francis Twain, Tom Pepper, Nebuchadnezzar, and Baalam's Ass—
they all belong to our family, but to a branch of it somewhat distinctly
removed from the honorable direct line—in fact, a collateral branch, whose
members chiefly differ from the ancient stock in that, in order to acquire the
notoriety we have always yearned and hungered for, they have got into a
low way of going to jail instead of getting hanged.
It is not well, when writing an autobiography, to follow your ancestry
down too close to your own time—it is safest to speak only vaguely of your
great-grandfather, and then skip from there to yourself, which I now do.
I was born without teeth—and there Richard III. had the advantage of
me; but I was born without a humpback, likewise, and there I had the
advantage of him. My parents were neither very poor nor conspicuously
honest.
But now a thought occurs to me. My own history would really seem so
tame contrasted with that of my ancestors, that it is simply wisdom to leave
it unwritten until I am hanged. If some other biographies I have read had
stopped with the ancestry until a like event occurred, it would have been a
felicitous thing for the reading public. How does it strike you?

HOW TO TELL A STORY
The Humorous Story an American Development.—Its Difference from
Comic and Witty Stories

I do not claim that I can tell a story as it ought to be told. I only claim to
know how a story ought to be told, for I have been almost daily in the
company of the most expert story-tellers for many years.
There are several kinds of stories, but only one difficult kind—the
humorous. I will talk mainly about that one. The humorous story is
American, the comic story is English, the witty story is French. The
humorous story depends for its effect upon the manner of the telling; the
comic story and the witty story upon the matter.
The humorous story may be spun out to great length, and may wander
around as much as it pleases, and arrive nowhere in particular; but the
comic and witty stories must be brief and end with a point. The humorous
story bubbles gently along, the others burst.
The humorous story is strictly a work of art—high and delicate art—and
only an artist can tell it; but no art is necessary in telling the comic and the
witty story; anybody can do it. The art of telling a humorous story—
understand, I mean by word of mouth, not print—was created in America,
and has remained at home.
The humorous story is told gravely; the teller does his best to conceal the
fact that he even dimly suspects that there is anything funny about it; but
the teller of the comic story tells you beforehand that it is one of the
funniest things he has ever heard, then tells it with eager delight, and is the
first person to laugh when he gets through. And sometimes, if he has had
good success, he is so glad and happy that he will repeat the “nub” of it and
glance around from face to face, collecting applause, and then repeat it
again. It is a pathetic thing to see.
Very often, of course, the rambling and disjointed humorous story
finishes with a nub, point, snapper, or whatever you like to call it. Then the
listener must be alert, for in many cases the teller will divert attention from

that nub by dropping it in a carefully casual and indifferent way, with the
pretense that he does not know it is a nub.
Artemus Ward used that trick a good deal; then when the belated
audience presently caught the joke he would look up with innocent surprise,
as if wondering what they had found to laugh at. Dan Setchell used it before
him, Nye and Riley and others use it today.
But the teller of the comic story does not slur the nub; he shouts it at you
—every time. And when he prints it, in England, France, Germany, and
Italy, he italicizes it, puts some whopping exclamation-points after it, and
sometimes explains it in a parenthesis. All of which is very depressing, and
makes one want to renounce joking and lead a better life.
Let me set down an instance of the comic method, using an anecdote
which has been popular all over the world for twelve or fifteen hundred
years. The teller tells it in this way:

THE WOUNDED SOLDIER

In the course of a certain battle a soldier whose leg had been shot off
appealed to another soldier who was hurrying by to carry him to the rear,
informing him at the same time of the loss which he had sustained;
whereupon the generous son of Mars, shouldering the unfortunate,
proceeded to carry out his desire. The bullets and cannon-balls were flying
in all directions, and presently one of the latter took the wounded man's
head off—without, however, his deliverer being aware of it. In no long time
he was hailed by an officer, who said:
“Where are you going with that carcass?”
“To the rear, sir—he's lost his leg!”
“His leg, forsooth?” responded the astonished officer; “you mean his
head, you booby.”
Whereupon the soldier dispossessed himself of his burden, and stood
looking down upon it in great perplexity. At length he said:
“It is true, sir, just as you have said.” Then after a pause he added, “But
he TOLD me IT WAS HIS LEG!!!!!”
Here the narrator bursts into explosion after explosion of thunderous
horse-laughter, repeating that nub from time to time through his gasping

and shriekings and suffocatings.
It takes only a minute and a half to tell that in its comic-story form; and
isn't worth the telling, after all. Put into the humorous-story form it takes
ten minutes, and is about the funniest thing I have ever listened to—as
James Whitcomb Riley tells it.
He tells it in the character of a dull-witted old farmer who has just heard
it for the first time, thinks it is unspeakably funny, and is trying to repeat it
to a neighbor. But he can't remember it; so he gets all mixed up and
wanders helplessly round and round, putting in tedious details that don't
belong in the tale and only retard it; taking them out conscientiously and
putting in others that are just as useless; making minor mistakes now and
then and stopping to correct them and explain how he came to make them;
remembering things which he forgot to put in in their proper place and
going back to put them in there; stopping his narrative a good while in order
to try to recall the name of the soldier that was hurt, and finally
remembering that the soldier's name was not mentioned, and remarking
placidly that the name is of no real importance, anyway—better, of course,
if one knew it, but not essential, after all—and so on, and so on, and so on.
The teller is innocent and happy and pleased with himself, and has to
stop every little while to hold himself in and keep from laughing outright;
and does hold in, but his body quakes in a jelly-like way with interior
chuckles; and at the end of the ten minutes the audience have laughed until
they are exhausted, and the tears are running down their faces.
The simplicity and innocence and sincerity and unconsciousness of the
old farmer are perfectly simulated, and the result is a performance which is
thoroughly charming and delicious. This is art—and fine and beautiful, and
only a master can compass it; but a machine could tell the other story.
To string incongruities and absurdities together in a wandering and
sometimes purposeless way, and seem innocently unaware that they are
absurdities, is the basis of the American art, if my position is correct.
Another feature is the slurring of the point. A third is the dropping of a
studied remark apparently without knowing it, as if one where thinking
aloud. The fourth and last is the pause.
Artemus Ward dealt in numbers three and four a good deal. He would
begin to tell with great animation something which he seemed to think was
wonderful; then lose confidence, and after an apparently absent-minded

pause add an incongruous remark in a soliloquizing way; and that was the
remark intended to explode the mine—and it did.
For instance, he would say eagerly, excitedly, “I once knew a man in
New Zealand who hadn't a tooth in his head”—here his animation would
die out; a silent, reflective pause would follow, then he would say dreamily,
and as if to himself, “and yet that man could beat a drum better than any
man I ever saw.”
The pause is an exceedingly important feature in any kind of story, and a
frequently recurring feature, too. It is a dainty thing, and delicate, and also
uncertain and treacherous; for it must be exactly the right length—no more
and no less—or it fails of its purpose and makes trouble. If the pause is too
short the impressive point is passed, and the audience have had time to
divine that a surprise is intended—and then you can't surprise them, of
course.
On the platform I used to tell a negro ghost story that had a pause in front
of the snapper on the end, and that pause was the most important thing in
the whole story. If I got it the right length precisely, I could spring the
finishing ejaculation with effect enough to make some impressible girl
deliver a startled little yelp and jump out of her seat—and that was what I
was after. This story was called “The Golden Arm,” and was told in this
fashion. You can practice with it yourself—and mind you look out for the
pause and get it right.

THE GOLDEN ARM

Once 'pon a time dey wuz a monsus mean man, en he live 'way out in de
prairie all 'lone by hisself, 'cep'n he had a wife. En bimeby she died, en he
tuck en toted her way out dah in de prairie en buried her. Well, she had a
golden arm—all solid gold, fum de shoulder down. He wuz pow'ful mean—
pow'ful; en dat night he couldn't sleep, caze he want dat golden arm so bad.
When it come midnight he couldn't stan' it no mo'; so he git up, he did, en
tuck his lantern en shoved out thoo de storm en dug her up en got de golden
arm; en he bent his head down 'gin de win', en plowed en plowed en plowed
thoo de snow. Den all on a sudden he stop (make a considerable pause here,
and look startled, and take a listening attitude) en say: “My lan', what's
dat?”

En he listen—en listen—en de win' say (set your teeth together and
imitate the wailing and wheezing singsong of the wind), “Bzzz-z-zzz”—en
den, way back yonder whah de grave is, he hear a voice!—he hear a voice
all mix' up in de win'—can't hardly tell 'em 'part— “Bzzz—zzz—W-h-o—
g-o-t—m-y—g-o-l-d-e-n arm?” (You must begin to shiver violently now.)
En he begin to shiver en shake, en say, “Oh, my! Oh, my lan'!” en de win'
blow de lantern out, en de snow en sleet blow in his face en mos' choke
him, en he start a-plowin' knee-deep toward home mos' dead, he so sk'yerd
—en pooty soon he hear de voice agin, en (pause) it 'us comin after him!
“Bzzz—zzz—zzz W-h-o—g-o-t—m-y—g-o-l-d-e-n—arm?”
When he git to de pasture he hear it agin—closter now, en a-comin'!—a-
comin' back dah in de dark en de storm—(repeat the wind and the voice).
When he git to de house he rush upstairs en jump in de bed en kiver up,
head and years, en lay da shiverin' en shakin'—en den way out dah he hear
it agin!—en a-comin'! En bimeby he hear (pause—awed, listening attitude)
—pat—pat—pat Hit's a-comin' upstairs! Den he hear de latch, en he know
it's in de room!
Den pooty soon he know it's a-stannin' by de bed! (Pause.) Den—he
know it's a-bendin' down over him—en he cain't skasely git his breath! Den
—den—he seem to feel someth'n' c-o-l-d, right down 'most agin his head!
(Pause.)
Den de voice say, right at his year—“W-h-o—g-o-t—m-y g-o-l-d-e-n
arm?” (You must wail it out very plaintively and accusingly; then you stare
steadily and impressively into the face of the farthest-gone auditor—a girl,
preferably—and let that awe-inspiring pause begin to build itself in the deep
hush. When it has reached exactly the right length, jump suddenly at that
girl and yell, “You've got it!”)
If you've got the pause right, she'll fetch a dear little yelp and spring right
out of her shoes. But you must get the pause right; and you will find it the
most troublesome and aggravating and uncertain thing you ever undertook.

GENERAL WASHINGTON'S NEGRO BODY-
SERVANT
A Biographical Sketch

The stirring part of this celebrated colored man's life properly began with
his death—that is to say, the notable features of his biography began with
the first time he died. He had been little heard of up to that time, but since
then we have never ceased to hear of him; we have never ceased to hear of
him at stated, unfailing intervals. His was a most remarkable career, and I
have thought that its history would make a valuable addition to our
biographical literature. Therefore, I have carefully collated the materials for
such a work, from authentic sources, and here present them to the public. I
have rigidly excluded from these pages everything of a doubtful character,
with the object in view of introducing my work into the schools for the
instruction of the youth of my country.
The name of the famous body-servant of General Washington was
George. After serving his illustrious master faithfully for half a century, and
enjoying throughout this long term his high regard and confidence, it
became his sorrowful duty at last to lay that beloved master to rest in his
peaceful grave by the Potomac. Ten years afterward—in 1809—full of
years and honors, he died himself, mourned by all who knew him. The
Boston Gazette of that date thus refers to the event:
George, the favorite body-servant of the lamented Washington, died
in Richmond, Va., last Tuesday, at the ripe age of 95 years. His
intellect was unimpaired, and his memory tenacious, up to within a
few minutes of his decease. He was present at the second installation
of Washington as President, and also at his funeral, and distinctly
remembered all the prominent incidents connected with those noted
events.

From this period we hear no more of the favorite body-servant of General
Washington until May, 1825, at which time he died again. A Philadelphia
paper thus speaks of the sad occurrence:

At Macon, Ga., last week, a colored man named George, who was
the favorite body-servant of General Washington, died at the advanced
age of 95 years. Up to within a few hours of his dissolution he was in
full possession of all his faculties, and could distinctly recollect the
second installation of Washington, his death and burial, the surrender
of Cornwallis, the battle of Trenton, the griefs and hardships of Valley
Forge, etc. Deceased was followed to the grave by the entire
population of Macon.

On the Fourth of July, 1830, and also of 1834 and 1836, the subject of
this sketch was exhibited in great state upon the rostrum of the orator of the
day, and in November of 1840 he died again. The St. Louis Republican of
the 25th of that month spoke as follows:
“ANOTHER RELIC OF THE REVOLUTION GONE.”
“George, once the favorite body-servant of General Washington,
died yesterday at the house of Mr. John Leavenworth in this city, at the
venerable age of 95 years. He was in the full possession of his faculties
up to the hour of his death, and distinctly recollected the first and
second installations and death of President Washington, the surrender
of Cornwallis, the battles of Trenton and Monmouth, the sufferings of
the patriot army at Valley Forge, the proclamation of the Declaration
of Independence, the speech of Patrick Henry in the Virginia House of
Delegates, and many other old-time reminiscences of stirring interest.
Few white men die lamented as was this aged negro. The funeral was
very largely attended.”

During the next ten or eleven years the subject of this sketch appeared at
intervals at Fourth-of-July celebrations in various parts of the country, and
was exhibited upon the rostrum with flattering success. But in the fall of
1855 he died again. The California papers thus speak of the event:
ANOTHER OLD HERO GONE
Died, at Dutch Flat, on the 7th of March, George (once the
confidential body-servant of General Washington), at the great age of
95 years. His memory, which did not fail him till the last, was a
wonderful storehouse of interesting reminiscences. He could distinctly
recollect the first and second installations and death of President
Washington, the surrender of Cornwallis, the battles of Trenton and
Monmouth, and Bunker Hill, the proclamation of the Declaration of
Independence, and Braddock's defeat. George was greatly respected in
Dutch Flat, and it is estimated that there were 10,000 people present at
his funeral.

The last time the subject of this sketch died was in June, 1864; and until
we learn the contrary, it is just to presume that he died permanently this
time. The Michigan papers thus refer to the sorrowful event:

ANOTHER CHERISHED REMNANT OF THE REVOLUTION
GONE
George, a colored man, and once the favorite body-servant of
George Washington, died in Detroit last week, at the patriarchal age of
95 years. To the moment of his death his intellect was unclouded, and
he could distinctly remember the first and second installations and
death of Washington, the surrender of Cornwallis, the battles of
Trenton and Monmouth, and Bunker Hill, the proclamation of the
Declaration of Independence, Braddock's defeat, the throwing over of
the tea in Boston harbor, and the landing of the Pilgrims. He died
greatly respected, and was followed to the grave by a vast concourse
of people.

The faithful old servant is gone! We shall never see him more until he
turns up again. He has closed his long and splendid career of dissolution,
for the present, and sleeps peacefully, as only they sleep who have earned
their rest. He was in all respects a remarkable man. He held his age better
than any celebrity that has figured in history; and the longer he lived the
stronger and longer his memory grew. If he lives to die again, he will
distinctly recollect the discovery of America.
The above resume of his biography I believe to be substantially correct,
although it is possible that he may have died once or twice in obscure
places where the event failed of newspaper notoriety. One fault I find in all
the notices of his death I have quoted, and this ought to be corrected. In
them he uniformly and impartially died at the age of 95. This could not
have been. He might have done that once, or maybe twice, but he could not
have continued it indefinitely. Allowing that when he first died, he died at
the age of 95, he was 151 years old when he died last, in 1864. But his age
did not keep pace with his recollections. When he died the last time, he
distinctly remembered the landing of the Pilgrims, which took place in
1620. He must have been about twenty years old when he witnessed that
event, wherefore it is safe to assert that the body-servant of General
Washington was in the neighborhood of two hundred and sixty or seventy
years old when he departed this life finally.
Having waited a proper length of time, to see if the subject of his sketch
had gone from us reliably and irrevocably, I now publish his biography with
confidence, and respectfully offer it to a mourning nation.
P.S.—I see by the papers that this infamous old fraud has just died again,
in Arkansas. This makes six times that he is known to have died, and always
in a new place. The death of Washington's body-servant has ceased to be a

novelty; it's charm is gone; the people are tired of it; let it cease. This well-
meaning but misguided negro has now put six different communities to the
expense of burying him in state, and has swindled tens of thousands of
people into following him to the grave under the delusion that a select and
peculiar distinction was being conferred upon them. Let him stay buried for
good now; and let that newspaper suffer the severest censure that shall ever,
in all the future time, publish to the world that General Washington's
favorite colored body-servant has died again.

WIT INSPIRATIONS OF THE “TWO-YEAR-
OLDS”
All infants appear to have an impertinent and disagreeable fashion
nowadays of saying “smart” things on most occasions that offer, and
especially on occasions when they ought not to be saying anything at all.
Judging by the average published specimens of smart sayings, the rising
generation of children are little better than idiots. And the parents must
surely be but little better than the children, for in most cases they are the
publishers of the sunbursts of infantile imbecility which dazzle us from the
pages of our periodicals. I may seem to speak with some heat, not to say a
suspicion of personal spite; and I do admit that it nettles me to hear about so
many gifted infants in these days, and remember that I seldom said anything
smart when I was a child. I tried it once or twice, but it was not popular. The
family were not expecting brilliant remarks from me, and so they snubbed
me sometimes and spanked me the rest. But it makes my flesh creep and my
blood run cold to think what might have happened to me if I had dared to
utter some of the smart things of this generation's “four-year-olds” where
my father could hear me. To have simply skinned me alive and considered
his duty at an end would have seemed to him criminal leniency toward one
so sinning. He was a stern, unsmiling man, and hated all forms of precocity.
If I had said some of the things I have referred to, and said them in his
hearing, he would have destroyed me. He would, indeed. He would,
provided the opportunity remained with him. But it would not, for I would
have had judgment enough to take some strychnine first and say my smart
thing afterward. The fair record of my life has been tarnished by just one
pun. My father overheard that, and he hunted me over four or five
townships seeking to take my life. If I had been full-grown, of course he
would have been right; but, child as I was, I could not know how wicked a
thing I had done.
I made one of those remarks ordinarily called “smart things” before that,
but it was not a pun. Still, it came near causing a serious rupture between
my father and myself. My father and mother, my uncle Ephraim and his
wife, and one or two others were present, and the conversation turned on a

name for me. I was lying there trying some India-rubber rings of various
patterns, and endeavoring to make a selection, for I was tired of trying to
cut my teeth on people's fingers, and wanted to get hold of something that
would enable me to hurry the thing through and get something else. Did
you ever notice what a nuisance it was cutting your teeth on your nurse's
finger, or how back-breaking and tiresome it was trying to cut them on your
big toe? And did you never get out of patience and wish your teeth were in
Jerico long before you got them half cut? To me it seems as if these things
happened yesterday. And they did, to some children. But I digress. I was
lying there trying the India-rubber rings. I remember looking at the clock
and noticing that in an hour and twenty-five minutes I would be two weeks
old, and thinking how little I had done to merit the blessings that were so
unsparingly lavished upon me. My father said:
“Abraham is a good name. My grandfather was named Abraham.”
My mother said:
“Abraham is a good name. Very well. Let us have Abraham for one of his
names.”
I said:
“Abraham suits the subscriber.”
My father frowned, my mother looked pleased; my aunt said:
“What a little darling it is!”
My father said:
“Isaac is a good name, and Jacob is a good name.”
My mother assented, and said:
“No names are better. Let us add Isaac and Jacob to his names.”
I said:
“All right. Isaac and Jacob are good enough for yours truly. Pass me that
rattle, if you please. I can't chew India-rubber rings all day.”
Not a soul made a memorandum of these sayings of mine, for
publication. I saw that, and did it myself, else they would have been utterly
lost. So far from meeting with a generous encouragement like other
children when developing intellectually, I was now furiously scowled upon
by my father; my mother looked grieved and anxious, and even my aunt
had about her an expression of seeming to think that maybe I had gone too

far. I took a vicious bite out of an India-rubber ring, and covertly broke the
rattle over the kitten's head, but said nothing. Presently my father said:
“Samuel is a very excellent name.”
I saw that trouble was coming. Nothing could prevent it. I laid down my
rattle; over the side of the cradle I dropped my uncle's silver watch, the
clothes-brush, the toy dog, my tin soldier, the nutmeg-grater, and other
matters which I was accustomed to examine, and meditate upon and make
pleasant noises with, and bang and batter and break when I needed
wholesome entertainment. Then I put on my little frock and my little
bonnet, and took my pygmy shoes in one hand and my licorice in the other,
and climbed out on the floor. I said to myself, Now, if the worse comes to
worst, I am ready. Then I said aloud, in a firm voice:
“Father, I cannot, cannot wear the name of Samuel.”
“My son!”
“Father, I mean it. I cannot.”
“Why?”
“Father, I have an invincible antipathy to that name.”
“My son, this is unreasonable. Many great and good men have been
named Samuel.”
“Sir, I have yet to hear of the first instance.”
“What! There was Samuel the prophet. Was not he great and good?”
“Not so very.”
“My son! With His own voice the Lord called him.”
“Yes, sir, and had to call him a couple times before he could come!”
And then I sallied forth, and that stern old man sallied forth after me. He
overtook me at noon the following day, and when the interview was over I
had acquired the name of Samuel, and a thrashing, and other useful
information; and by means of this compromise my father's wrath was
appeased and a misunderstanding bridged over which might have become a
permanent rupture if I had chosen to be unreasonable. But just judging by
this episode, what would my father have done to me if I had ever uttered in
his hearing one of the flat, sickly things these “two-years-olds” say in print
nowadays? In my opinion there would have been a case of infanticide in our
family.

AN ENTERTAINING ARTICLE
I take the following paragraph from an article in the Boston Advertiser:

AN ENGLISH CRITIC ON MARK TWAIN
Perhaps the most successful flights of humor of Mark Twain have
been descriptions of the persons who did not appreciate his humor at
all. We have become familiar with the Californians who were thrilled
with terror by his burlesque of a newspaper reporter'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
“the man who could shed tears over the tomb of Adam must be an
idiot.” But Mark Twain may now add a much more glorious instance
to his string of trophies. The Saturday Review, in its number of
October 8th, reviews his book of travels, which has been republished
in England, and reviews it seriously. We can imagine the delight of the
humorist in reading this tribute to his power; and indeed it is so
amusing in itself that he can hardly do better than reproduce the article
in full in his next monthly Memoranda.

(Publishing the above paragraph thus, gives me a sort of authority for
reproducing the Saturday Review's article in full in these pages. I dearly
wanted to do it, for I cannot write anything half so delicious myself. If I had
a cast-iron dog that could read this English criticism and preserve his
austerity, I would drive him off the door-step.)
(From the London “Saturday Review.”)

REVIEWS OF NEW BOOKS

The Innocents Abroad. A Book of Travels. By Mark Twain. London:
Hotten, publisher. 1870.
Lord Macaulay died too soon. We never felt this so deeply as when we
finished the last chapter of the above-named extravagant work. Macaulay
died too soon—for none but he could mete out complete and
comprehensive justice to the insolence, the impertinence, the presumption,
the mendacity, and, above all, the majestic ignorance of this author.

To say that The Innocents Abroad is a curious book, would be to use the
faintest language—would be to speak of the Matterhorn as a neat elevation
or of Niagara as being “nice” or “pretty.” “Curious” is too tame a word
wherewith to describe the imposing insanity of this work. There is no word
that is large enough or long enough. Let us, therefore, photograph a passing
glimpse of book and author, and trust the rest to the reader. Let the
cultivated English student of human nature picture to himself this Mark
Twain as a person capable of doing the following-described things—and not
only doing them, but with incredible innocence printing them calmly and
tranquilly in a book. For instance:
He states that he entered a hair-dresser's in Paris to get shaved, and the
first “_rake_” the barber gave him with his razor it loosened his “_hide_”
and lifted him out of the chair.
This is unquestionably exaggerated. In Florence he was so annoyed by
beggars that he pretends to have seized and eaten one in a frantic spirit of
revenge. There is, of course, no truth in this. He gives at full length a
theatrical program seventeen or eighteen hundred years old, which he
professes to have found in the ruins of the Coliseum, among the dirt and
mold and rubbish. It is a sufficient comment upon this statement to remark
that even a cast-iron program would not have lasted so long under such
circumstances. In Greece he plainly betrays both fright and flight upon one
occasion, but with frozen effrontery puts the latter in this falsely tamed
form: “We sidled toward the Piraeus.” “Sidled,” indeed! He does not
hesitate to intimate that at Ephesus, when his mule strayed from the proper
course, he got down, took him under his arm, carried him to the road again,
pointed him right, remounted, and went to sleep contentedly till it was time
to restore the beast to the path once more. He states that a growing youth
among his ship's passengers was in the constant habit of appeasing his
hunger with soap and oakum between meals. In Palestine he tells of ants
that came eleven miles to spend the summer in the desert and brought their
provisions with them; yet he shows by his description of the country that
the feat was an impossibility. He mentions, as if it were the most
commonplace of matters, that he cut a Moslem in two in broad daylight in
Jerusalem, with Godfrey de Bouillon's sword, and would have shed more
blood if he had had a graveyard of his own. These statements are unworthy
a moment's attention. Mr. Twain or any other foreigner who did such a thing
in Jerusalem would be mobbed, and would infallibly lose his life. But why

go on? Why repeat more of his audacious and exasperating falsehoods? Let
us close fittingly with this one: he affirms that “in the mosque of St. Sophia
at Constantinople I got my feet so stuck up with a complication of gums,
slime, and general impurity, that I wore out more than two thousand pair of
bootjacks getting my boots off that night, and even then some Christian
hide peeled off with them.” It is monstrous. Such statements are simply lies
—there is no other name for them. Will the reader longer marvel at the
brutal ignorance that pervades the American nation when we tell him that
we are informed upon perfectly good authority that this extravagant
compilation of falsehoods, this exhaustless mine of stupendous lies, this
Innocents Abroad, has actually been adopted by the schools and colleges of
several of the states as a text-book!
But if his falsehoods are distressing, his innocence and his ignorance are
enough to make one burn the book and despise the author. In one place he
was so appalled at the sudden spectacle of a murdered man, unveiled by the
moonlight, that he jumped out of the window, going through sash and all,
and then remarks with the most childlike simplicity that he “was not scared,
but was considerably agitated.” It puts us out of patience to note that the
simpleton is densely unconscious that Lucrezia Borgia ever existed off the
stage. He is vulgarly ignorant of all foreign languages, but is frank enough
to criticize, the Italians' use of their own tongue. He says they spell the
name of their great painter “Vinci, but pronounce it Vinchy”—and then
adds with a naivete possible only to helpless ignorance, “foreigners always
spell better than they pronounce.” In another place he commits the bald
absurdity of putting the phrase “tare an ouns” into an Italian's mouth. In
Rome he unhesitatingly believes the legend that St. Philip Neri's heart was
so inflamed with divine love that it burst his ribs—believes it wholly
because an author with a learned list of university degrees strung after his
name endorses it—“otherwise,” says this gentle idiot, “I should have felt a
curiosity to know what Philip had for dinner.” Our author makes a long,
fatiguing journey to the Grotto del Cane on purpose to test its poisoning
powers on a dog—got elaborately ready for the experiment, and then
discovered that he had no dog. A wiser person would have kept such a thing
discreetly to himself, but with this harmless creature everything comes out.
He hurts his foot in a rut two thousand years old in exhumed Pompeii, and
presently, when staring at one of the cinder-like corpses unearthed in the
next square, conceives the idea that maybe it is the remains of the ancient

Street Commissioner, and straightway his horror softens down to a sort of
chirpy contentment with the condition of things. In Damascus he visits the
well of Ananias, three thousand years old, and is as surprised and delighted
as a child to find that the water is “as pure and fresh as if the well had been
dug yesterday.” In the Holy Land he gags desperately at the hard Arabic and
Hebrew Biblical names, and finally concludes to call them Baldwinsville,
Williamsburgh, and so on, “for convenience of spelling.”
We have thus spoken freely of this man's stupefying simplicity and
innocence, but we cannot deal similarly with his colossal ignorance. We do
not know where to begin. And if we knew where to begin, we certainly
would not know where to leave off. We will give one specimen, and one
only. He did not know, until he got to Rome, that Michael Angelo was dead!
And then, instead of crawling away and hiding his shameful ignorance
somewhere, he proceeds to express a pious, grateful sort of satisfaction that
he is gone and out of his troubles!
No, the reader may seek out the author's exhibition of his uncultivation
for himself. The book is absolutely dangerous, considering the magnitude
and variety of its misstatements, and the convincing confidence with which
they are made. And yet it is a text-book in the schools of America.
The poor blunderer mouses among the sublime creations of the Old
Masters, trying to acquire the elegant proficiency in art-knowledge, which
he has a groping sort of comprehension is a proper thing for a traveled man
to be able to display. But what is the manner of his study? And what is the
progress he achieves? To what extent does he familiarize himself with the
great pictures of Italy, and what degree of appreciation does he arrive at?
Read:
“When we see a monk going about with a lion and looking up into
heaven, we know that that is St. Mark. When we see a monk with a book
and a pen, looking tranquilly up to heaven, trying to think of a word, we
know that that is St. Matthew. When we see a monk sitting on a rock,
looking tranquilly up to heaven, with a human skull beside him, and
without other baggage, we know that that is St. Jerome. Because we know
that he always went flying light in the matter of baggage. When we see
other monks looking tranquilly up to heaven, but having no trade-mark, we
always ask who those parties are. We do this because we humbly wish to
learn.”

He then enumerates the thousands and thousand of copies of these
several pictures which he has seen, and adds with accustomed simplicity
that he feels encouraged to believe that when he has seen “Some More” of
each, and had a larger experience, he will eventually “begin to take an
absorbing interest in them”—the vulgar boor.
That we have shown this to be a remarkable book, we think no one will
deny. That it is a pernicious book to place in the hands of the confiding and
uniformed, we think we have also shown. That the book is a deliberate and
wicked creation of a diseased mind, is apparent upon every page. Having
placed our judgment thus upon record, let us close with what charity we
can, by remarking that even in this volume there is some good to be found;
for whenever the author talks of his own country and lets Europe alone, he
never fails to make himself interesting, and not only interesting but
instructive. No one can read without benefit his occasional chapters and
paragraphs, about life in the gold and silver mines of California and
Nevada; about the Indians of the plains and deserts of the West, and their
cannibalism; about the raising of vegetables in kegs of gunpowder by the
aid of two or three teaspoons of guano; about the moving of small arms
from place to place at night in wheelbarrows to avoid taxes; and about a
sort of cows and mules in the Humboldt mines, that climb down chimneys
and disturb the people at night. These matters are not only new, but are well
worth knowing. It is a pity the author did not put in more of the same kind.
His book is well written and is exceedingly entertaining, and so it just
barely escaped being quite valuable also.

(One month later)

Latterly I have received several letters, and see a number of newspaper
paragraphs, all upon a certain subject, and all of about the same tenor. I here
give honest specimens. One is from a New York paper, one is from a letter
from an old friend, and one is from a letter from a New York publisher who
is a stranger to me. I humbly endeavor to make these bits toothsome with
the remark that the article they are praising (which appeared in the
December Galaxy, and pretended to be a criticism from the London
Saturday Review on my Innocents Abroad) was written by myself, every line
of it:

The Herald says the richest thing out is the “serious critique” in the
London Saturday Review, on Mark Twain's Innocents Abroad. We
thought before we read it that it must be “serious,” as everybody said
so, and were even ready to shed a few tears; but since perusing it, we
are bound to confess that next to Mark Twain's “Jumping Frog” it's the
finest bit of humor and sarcasm that we've come across in many a day.

(I do not get a compliment like that every day.)
I used to think that your writings were pretty good, but after reading
the criticism in The Galaxy from the London Review, have discovered
what an ass I must have been. If suggestions are in order, mine is, that
you put that article in your next edition of the Innocents, as an extra
chapter, if you are not afraid to put your own humor in competition
with it. It is as rich a thing as I ever read.

(Which is strong commendation from a book publisher.)
The London Reviewer, my friend, is not the stupid, “serious”
creature he pretends to be, I think; but, on the contrary, has a keen
appreciation and enjoyment of your book. As I read his article in The
Galaxy, I could imagine him giving vent to many a hearty laugh. But
he is writing for Catholics and Established Church people, and high-
toned, antiquated, conservative gentility, whom it is a delight to him to
help you shock, while he pretends to shake his head with owlish
density. He is a magnificent humorist himself.

(Now that is graceful and handsome. I take off my hat to my life-long
friend and comrade, and with my feet together and my fingers spread over
my heart, I say, in the language of Alabama, “You do me proud.”)
I stand guilty of the authorship of the article, but I did not mean any
harm. I saw by an item in the Boston Advertiser that a solemn, serious
critique on the English edition of my book had appeared in the London
Saturday Review, and the idea of such a literary breakfast by a stolid,
ponderous British ogre of the quill was too much for a naturally weak
virtue, and I went home and burlesqued it—reveled in it, I may say. I never
saw a copy of the real Saturday Review criticism until after my burlesque
was written and mailed to the printer. But when I did get hold of a copy, I
found it to be vulgar, awkwardly written, ill-natured, and entirely serious
and in earnest. The gentleman who wrote the newspaper paragraph above
quoted had not been misled as to its character.
If any man doubts my word now, I will kill him. No, I will not kill him; I
will win his money. I will bet him twenty to one, and let any New York
publisher hold the stakes, that the statements I have above made as to the

authorship of the article in question are entirely true. Perhaps I may get
wealthy at this, for I am willing to take all the bets that offer; and if a man
wants larger odds, I will give him all he requires. But he ought to find out
whether I am betting on what is termed “a sure thing” or not before he
ventures his money, and he can do that by going to a public library and
examining the London Saturday Review of October 8th, which contains the
real critique.
Bless me, some people thought that I was the “sold” person!
P.S.—I cannot resist the temptation to toss in this most savory thing of all
—this easy, graceful, philosophical disquisition, with his happy, chirping
confidence. It is from the Cincinnati Enquirer:
Nothing is more uncertain than the value of a fine cigar. Nine smokers
out of ten would prefer an ordinary domestic article, three for a quarter, to a
fifty-cent Partaga, if kept in ignorance of the cost of the latter. The flavor of
the Partaga is too delicate for palates that have been accustomed to
Connecticut seed leaf. So it is with humor. The finer it is in quality, the
more danger of its not being recognized at all. Even Mark Twain has been
taken in by an English review of his Innocents Abroad. Mark Twain is by
no means a coarse humorist, but the Englishman's humor is so much finer
than his, that he mistakes it for solid earnest, and “larfs most consumedly.”
A man who cannot learn stands in his own light. Hereafter, when I write
an article which I know to be good, but which I may have reason to fear
will not, in some quarters, be considered to amount to much, coming from
an American, I will aver that an Englishman wrote it and that it is copied
from a London journal. And then I will occupy a back seat and enjoy the
cordial applause.

(Still later)

Mark Twain at last sees that the Saturday Review's criticism of his
Innocents Abroad was not serious, and he is intensely mortified at the
thought of having been so badly sold. He takes the only course left
him, and in the last Galaxy claims that he wrote the criticism himself,
and published it in The Galaxy to sell the public. This is ingenious, but
unfortunately it is not true. If any of our readers will take the trouble to
call at this office we sill show them the original article in the Saturday
Review of October 8th, which, on comparison, will be found to be

identical with the one published in The Galaxy. The best thing for
Mark to do will be to admit that he was sold, and say no more about it.

The above is from the Cincinnati Enquirer, and is a falsehood. Come to
the proof. If the Enquirer people, through any agent, will produce at The
Galaxy office a London Saturday Review of October 8th, containing an
article which, on comparison, will be found to be identical with the one
published in The Galaxy, I will pay to that agent five hundred dollars cash.
Moreover, if at any specified time I fail to produce at the same place a copy
of the London Saturday Review of October 8th, containing a lengthy
criticism upon the Innocents Abroad, entirely different, in every paragraph
and sentence, from the one I published in The Galaxy, I will pay to the
Enquirer agent another five hundred dollars cash. I offer Sheldon & Co.,
publishers, 500 Broadway, New York, as my “backers.” Any one in New
York, authorized by the Enquirer, will receive prompt attention. It is an
easy and profitable way for the Enquirer people to prove that they have not
uttered a pitiful, deliberate falsehood in the above paragraphs. Will they
swallow that falsehood ignominiously, or will they send an agent to The
Galaxy office. I think the Cincinnati Enquirer must be edited by children.

A LETTER TO THE
SECRETARY OF THE
TREASURY
Riverdale-on-the-Hudson, OCTOBER 15, 1902.

The Hon. The Secretary Of The Treasury,Washington, D. C.:
Sir,—Prices for the customary kinds of winter fuel having reached
an altitude which puts them out of the reach of literary persons in
straitened circumstances, I desire to place with you the following
order:
Forty-five tons best old dry government bonds, suitable for furnace,
gold 7 per cents., 1864, preferred.
Twelve tons early greenbacks, range size, suitable for cooking.
Eight barrels seasoned 25 and 50 cent postal currency, vintage of
1866, eligible for kindlings.
Please deliver with all convenient despatch at my house in Riverdale
at lowest rates for spot cash, and send bill to
Your obliged servant,
Mark Twain, Who will be very grateful, and will vote right.

AMENDED OBITUARIES
TO THE EDITOR:
Sir,—I am approaching seventy; it is in sight; it is only three years
away. Necessarily, I must go soon. It is but matter-of-course wisdom,
then, that I should begin to set my worldly house in order now, so that
it may be done calmly and with thoroughness, in place of waiting until
the last day, when, as we have often seen, the attempt to set both
houses in order at the same time has been marred by the necessity for
haste and by the confusion and waste of time arising from the inability
of the notary and the ecclesiastic to work together harmoniously,
taking turn about and giving each other friendly assistance—not
perhaps in fielding, which could hardly be expected, but at least in the
minor offices of keeping game and umpiring; by consequence of
which conflict of interests and absence of harmonious action a draw
has frequently resulted where this ill-fortune could not have happened
if the houses had been set in order one at a time and hurry avoided by
beginning in season, and giving to each the amount of time fairly and
justly proper to it.
In setting my earthly house in order I find it of moment that I should
attend in person to one or two matters which men in my position have
long had the habit of leaving wholly to others, with consequences
often most regrettable. I wish to speak of only one of these matters at
this time: Obituaries. Of necessity, an Obituary is a thing which cannot
be so judiciously edited by any hand as by that of the subject of it. In
such a work it is not the Facts that are of chief importance, but the
light which the obituarist shall throw upon them, the meaning which
he shall dress them in, the conclusions which he shall draw from them,
and the judgments which he shall deliver upon them. The Verdicts, you
understand: that is the danger-line.
In considering this matter, in view of my approaching change, it has
seemed to me wise to take such measures as may be feasible, to
acquire, by courtesy of the press, access to my standing obituaries,
with the privilege—if this is not asking too much—of editing, not their
Facts, but their Verdicts. This, not for the present profit, further than as
concerns my family, but as a favorable influence usable on the Other
Side, where there are some who are not friendly to me.
With this explanation of my motives, I will now ask you of your
courtesy to make an appeal for me to the public press. It is my desire
that such journals and periodicals as have obituaries of me lying in
their pigeonholes, with a view to sudden use some day, will not wait
longer, but will publish them now, and kindly send me a marked copy.
My address is simply New York City—I have no other that is
permanent and not transient.

I will correct them—not the Facts, but the Verdicts—striking out
such clauses as could have a deleterious influence on the Other Side,
and replacing them with clauses of a more judicious character. I
should, of course, expect to pay double rates for both the omissions
and the substitutions; and I should also expect to pay quadruple rates
for all obituaries which proved to be rightly and wisely worded in the
originals, thus requiring no emendations at all.
It is my desire to leave these Amended Obituaries neatly bound
behind me as a perennial consolation and entertainment to my family,
and as an heirloom which shall have a mournful but definite
commercial value for my remote posterity.
I beg, sir, that you will insert this Advertisement (1t-eow, agate,
inside), and send the bill to
Yours very respectfully.
Mark Twain.
P.S.—For the best Obituary—one suitable for me to read in public,
and calculated to inspire regret—I desire to offer a Prize, consisting of
a Portrait of me done entirely by myself in pen and ink without
previous instructions. The ink warranted to be the kind used by the
very best artists.

A MONUMENT TO ADAM
Some one has revealed to the Tribune that I once suggested to Rev.
Thomas K. Beecher, of Elmira, New York, that we get up a monument to
Adam, and that Mr. Beecher favored the project. There is more to it than
that. The matter started as a joke, but it came somewhat near to
materializing.
It is long ago—thirty years. Mr. Darwin's Descent of Man has been in
print five or six years, and the storm of indignation raised by it was still
raging in pulpits and periodicals. In tracing the genesis of the human race
back to its sources, Mr. Darwin had left Adam out altogether. We had
monkeys, and “missing links,” and plenty of other kinds of ancestors, but
no Adam. Jesting with Mr. Beecher and other friends in Elmira, I said there
seemed to be a likelihood that the world would discard Adam and accept the
monkey, and that in the course of time Adam's very name would be
forgotten in the earth; therefore this calamity ought to be averted; a
monument would accomplish this, and Elmira ought not to waste this
honorable opportunity to do Adam a favor and herself a credit.
Then the unexpected happened. Two bankers came forward and took
hold of the matter—not for fun, not for sentiment, but because they saw in
the monument certain commercial advantages for the town. The project had
seemed gently humorous before—it was more than that now, with this stern
business gravity injected into it. The bankers discussed the monument with
me. We met several times. They proposed an indestructible memorial, to
cost twenty-five thousand dollars. The insane oddity of a monument set up
in a village to preserve a name that would outlast the hills and the rocks
without any such help, would advertise Elmira to the ends of the earth—and
draw custom. It would be the only monument on the planet to Adam, and in
the matter of interest and impressiveness could never have a rival until
somebody should set up a monument to the Milky Way.
People would come from every corner of the globe and stop off to look at
it, no tour of the world would be complete that left out Adam's monument.
Elmira would be a Mecca; there would be pilgrim ships at pilgrim rates,
pilgrim specials on the continent's railways; libraries would be written

about the monument, every tourist would kodak it, models of it would be
for sale everywhere in the earth, its form would become as familiar as the
figure of Napoleon.
One of the bankers subscribed five thousand dollars, and I think the other
one subscribed half as much, but I do not remember with certainty now
whether that was the figure or not. We got designs made—some of them
came from Paris.
In the beginning—as a detail of the project when it was yet a joke—I had
framed a humble and beseeching and perfervid petition to Congress
begging the government to build the monument, as a testimony of the Great
Republic's gratitude to the Father of the Human Race and as a token of her
loyalty to him in this dark day of humiliation when his older children were
doubting and deserting him. It seemed to me that this petition ought to be
presented, now—it would be widely and feelingly abused and ridiculed and
cursed, and would advertise our scheme and make our ground-floor stock
go off briskly. So I sent it to General Joseph R. Hawley, who was then in
the House, and he said he would present it. But he did not do it. I think he
explained that when he came to read it he was afraid of it: it was too
serious, to gushy, too sentimental—the House might take it for earnest.
We ought to have carried out our monument scheme; we could have
managed it without any great difficulty, and Elmira would now be the most
celebrated town in the universe.
Very recently I began to build a book in which one of the minor
characters touches incidentally upon a project for a monument to Adam,
and now the Tribune has come upon a trace of the forgotten jest of thirty
years ago. Apparently mental telegraphy is still in business. It is odd; but
the freaks of mental telegraphy are usually odd.

A HUMANE WORD FROM SATAN
(The following letter, signed by Satan and purporting to come from
him, we have reason to believe was not written by him, but by Mark
Twain.—Editor.)

TO THE EDITOR OF HARPER'S WEEKLY:
Dear Sir and Kinsman,—Let us have done with this frivolous talk.
The American Board accepts contributions from me every year: then
why shouldn't it from Mr. Rockefeller? In all the ages, three-fourths of
the support of the great charities has been conscience-money, as my
books will show: then what becomes of the sting when that term is
applied to Mr. Rockefeller's gift? The American Board's trade is
financed mainly from the graveyards. Bequests, you understand.
Conscience-money. Confession of an old crime and deliberate
perpetration of a new one; for deceased's contribution is a robbery of
his heirs. Shall the Board decline bequests because they stand for one
of these offenses every time and generally for both?
Allow me to continue. The charge most persistently and resentfully
and remorselessly dwelt upon is that Mr. Rockefeller's contribution is
incurably tainted by perjury—perjury proved against him in the courts.
It makes us smile—down in my place! Because there isn't a rich man
in your vast city who doesn't perjure himself every year before the tax
board. They are all caked with perjury, many layers thick. Iron-clad, so
to speak. If there is one that isn't, I desire to acquire him for my
museum, and will pay Dinosaur rates. Will you say it isn't infraction of
the law, but only annual evasion of it? Comfort yourselves with that
nice distinction if you like—for the present. But by and by, when you
arrive, I will show you something interesting: a whole hell-full of
evaders! Sometimes a frank law-breaker turns up elsewhere, but I get
those others every time.
To return to my muttons. I wish you to remember that my rich
perjurers are contributing to the American Board with frequency: it is
money filched from the sworn-off personal tax; therefore it is the
wages of sin; therefore it is my money; therefore it is I that contribute
it; and, finally, it is therefore as I have said: since the Board daily
accepts contributions from me, why should it decline them from Mr.
Rockefeller, who is as good as I am, let the courts say what they may?
SATAN.

INTRODUCTION TO “THE NEW GUIDE OF
THE CONVERSATION IN PORTUGUESE AND
ENGLISH”
by Pedro Carolino

In this world of uncertainties, there is, at any rate, one thing which may
be pretty confidently set down as a certainty: and that is, that this celebrated
little phrase-book will never die while the English language lasts. Its
delicious unconscious ridiculousness, and its enchanting naivete, are as
supreme and unapproachable, in their way, as are Shakespeare's sublimities.
Whatsoever is perfect in its kind, in literature, is imperishable: nobody can
imitate it successfully, nobody can hope to produce its fellow; it is perfect,
it must and will stand alone: its immortality is secure.
It is one of the smallest books in the world, but few big books have
received such wide attention, and been so much pondered by the grave and
learned, and so much discussed and written about by the thoughtful, the
thoughtless, the wise, and the foolish. Long notices of it have appeared,
from time to time, in the great English reviews, and in erudite and
authoritative philological periodicals; and it has been laughed at, danced
upon, and tossed in a blanket by nearly every newspaper and magazine in
the English-speaking world. Every scribbler, almost, has had his little fling
at it, at one time or another; I had mine fifteen years ago. The book gets out
of print, every now and then, and one ceases to hear of it for a season; but
presently the nations and near and far colonies of our tongue and lineage
call for it once more, and once more it issues from some London or
Continental or American press, and runs a new course around the globe,
wafted on its way by the wind of a world's laughter.
Many persons have believed that this book's miraculous stupidities were
studied and disingenuous; but no one can read the volume carefully through
and keep that opinion. It was written in serious good faith and deep
earnestness, by an honest and upright idiot who believed he knew
something of the English language, and could impart his knowledge to

others. The amplest proof of this crops out somewhere or other upon each
and every page. There are sentences in the book which could have been
manufactured by a man in his right mind, and with an intelligent and
deliberate purposes to seem innocently ignorant; but there are other
sentences, and paragraphs, which no mere pretended ignorance could ever
achieve—nor yet even the most genuine and comprehensive ignorance,
when unbacked by inspiration.
It is not a fraud who speaks in the following paragraph of the author's
Preface, but a good man, an honest man, a man whose conscience is at rest,
a man who believes he has done a high and worthy work for his nation and
his generation, and is well pleased with his performance:
We expect then, who the little book (for the care what we wrote him,
and for her typographical correction) that may be worth the
acceptation of the studious persons, and especially of the Youth, at
which we dedicate him particularly.
One cannot open this book anywhere and not find richness. To
prove that this is true, I will open it at random and copy the page I
happen to stumble upon. Here is the result:
DIALOGUE 16

FOR TO SEE THE TOWN
Anothony, go to accompany they gentilsmen, do they see the town.
We won't to see all that is it remarquable here.
Come with me, if you please. I shall not folget nothing what can to
merit your attention. Here we are near to cathedral; will you come in
there?
We will first to see him in oudside, after we shall go in there for to
look the interior.
Admire this master piece gothic architecture's.
The chasing of all they figures is astonishing' indeed.
The cupola and the nave are not less curious to see.
What is this palace how I see yonder?
It is the town hall.
And this tower here at this side?
It is the Observatory.
The bridge is very fine, it have ten arches, and is constructed of free
stone.
The streets are very layed out by line and too paved.
What is the circuit of this town?
Two leagues.

There is it also hospitals here?
It not fail them.
What are then the edifices the worthest to have seen?
It is the arsnehal, the spectacle's hall, the Cusiomhouse, and the
Purse.
We are going too see the others monuments such that the public
pawnbroker's office, the plants garden's, the money office's, the library.
That it shall be for another day; we are tired.

DIALOGUE 17

TO INFORM ONE'SELF OF A PERSON
How is that gentilman who you did speak by and by?
Is a German.
I did think him Englishman.
He is of the Saxony side.
He speak the french very well.
Tough he is German, he speak so much well italyan, french, spanish
and english, that among the Italyans, they believe him Italyan, he
speak the frenche as the Frenches himselves. The Spanishesmen
believe him Spanishing, and the Englishes, Englishman. It is difficult
to enjoy well so much several languages.
The last remark contains a general truth; but it ceases to be a truth
when one contracts it and applies it to an individual—provided that
that individual is the author of this book, Senhor Pedro Carolino. I am
sure I should not find it difficult “to enjoy well so much several
languages”—or even a thousand of them—if he did the translating for
me from the originals into his ostensible English.

ADVICE TO LITTLE GIRLS
Good little girls ought not to make mouths at their teachers for every
trifling offense. This retaliation should only be resorted to under peculiarly
aggravated circumstances.
If you have nothing but a rag-doll stuffed with sawdust, 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 “chewing-gum” away from
him by main force; it is better to rope him 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 this time of life, he will regard it as a
perfectly fair transaction. In all ages of the world this 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
spoil his clothes. It is better to scald him a little, for then you obtain
desirable results. You secure his immediate attention to the lessons you are
inculcating, and at the same time your hot water will have a tendency to
move impurities from his person, and possibly the skin, 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 afterward act quietly in the matter according to the dictates of your
best judgment.
You should ever bear in mind that it is to your kind parents that you are
indebted for your food, 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 humor their little whims, and put up with their little foibles
until they get to crowding you too much.
Good little girls always show marked deference for the aged. You ought
never to “sass” old people unless they “sass” you first.

POST-MORTEM POETRY (1)
In Philadelphia they have a custom which it would be pleasant to see
adopted throughout the land. It is that of appending to published death-
notices a little verse or two of comforting poetry. Any one who is in the
habit of reading the daily Philadelphia Ledger must frequently be touched
by these plaintive tributes to extinguished worth. In Philadelphia, the
departure of a child is a circumstance which is not more surely followed by
a burial than by the accustomed solacing poesy in the Public Ledger. In that
city death loses half its terror because the knowledge of its presence comes
thus disguised in the sweet drapery of verse. For instance, in a late Ledger I
find the following (I change the surname):

DIED

Hawks.—On the 17th inst., Clara, the daughter of Ephraim and Laura
Hawks, aged 21 months and 2 days.

That merry shout no more I hear,
No laughing child I see,
No little arms are around my neck,
No feet upon my knee;

No kisses drop upon my cheek,
These lips are sealed to me.
Dear Lord, how could I give Clara up
To any but to Thee?

A child thus mourned could not die wholly discontented. From the
Ledger of the same date I make the following extract, merely changing the
surname, as before:
Becket.—On Sunday morning, 19th inst., John P., infant son of George
and Julia Becket, aged 1 year, 6 months, and 15 days.

That merry shout no more I hear,
No laughing child I see,
No little arms are round my neck,
No feet upon my knee;

No kisses drop upon my cheek;

These lips are sealed to me.
Dear Lord, how could I give Johnnie up
To any but to Thee?

The similarity of the emotions as produced in the mourners in these two
instances is remarkably evidenced by the singular similarity of thought
which they experienced, and the surprising coincidence of language used by
them to give it expression.
In the same journal, of the same date, I find the following (surname
suppressed, as before):
Wagner.—On the 10th inst., Ferguson G., the son of William L. and
Martha Theresa Wagner, aged 4 weeks and 1 day.

That merry shout no more I hear,
No laughing child I see,
No little arms are round my neck,
No feet upon my knee;

No kisses drop upon my cheek,
These lips are sealed to me.
Dear Lord, how could I give Ferguson up
To any but to Thee?

It is strange what power the reiteration of an essentially poetical thought
has upon one's feelings. When we take up the Ledger and read the poetry
about little Clara, we feel an unaccountable depression of the spirits. When
we drift further down the column and read the poetry about little Johnnie,
the depression and spirits acquires an added emphasis, and we experience
tangible suffering. When we saunter along down the column further still
and read the poetry about little Ferguson, the word torture but vaguely
suggests the anguish that rends us.
In the Ledger (same copy referred to above) I find the following (I alter
surname, as usual):
Welch.—On the 5th inst., Mary C. Welch, wife of William B. Welch, and
daughter of Catharine and George W. Markland, in the 29th year of her age.

A mother dear, a mother kind,
Has gone and left us all behind.
Cease to weep, for tears are vain,
Mother dear is out of pain.

Farewell, husband, children dear,
Serve thy God with filial fear,
And meet me in the land above,
Where all is peace, and joy, and love.

What could be sweeter than that? No collection of salient facts (without
reduction to tabular form) could be more succinctly stated than is done in
the first stanza by the surviving relatives, and no more concise and
comprehensive program of farewells, post-mortuary general orders, etc.,
could be framed in any form than is done in verse by deceased in the last
stanza. These things insensibly make us wiser and tenderer, and better.
Another extract:
Ball.—On the morning of the 15th inst., Mary E., daughter of John and
Sarah F. Ball.

'Tis sweet to rest in lively hope
That when my change shall come
Angels will hover round my bed,
To waft my spirit home.

The following is apparently the customary form for heads of families:
Burns.—On the 20th inst., Michael Burns, aged 40 years.

Dearest father, thou hast left us,
Here thy loss we deeply feel;
But 'tis God that has bereft us,
He can all our sorrows heal.

Funeral at 2 o'clock sharp.

There is something very simple and pleasant about the following, which,
in Philadelphia, seems to be the usual form for consumptives of long
standing. (It deplores four distinct cases in the single copy of the Ledger
which lies on the Memoranda editorial table):
Bromley.—On the 29th inst., of consumption, Philip Bromley, in the 50th
year of his age.

Affliction sore long time he bore,
Physicians were in vain—
Till God at last did hear him mourn,
And eased him of his pain.

That friend whom death from us has torn,
We did not think so soon to part;
An anxious care now sinks the thorn
Still deeper in our bleeding heart.

This beautiful creation loses nothing by repetition. On the contrary, the
oftener one sees it in the Ledger, the more grand and awe-inspiring it
seems.

With one more extract I will close:
Doble.—On the 4th inst., Samuel Pervil Worthington Doble, aged 4 days.

Our little Sammy's gone,
His tiny spirit's fled;
Our little boy we loved so dear
Lies sleeping with the dead.

A tear within a father's eye,
A mother's aching heart,
Can only tell the agony
How hard it is to part.

Could anything be more plaintive than that, without requiring further
concessions of grammar? Could anything be likely to do more toward
reconciling deceased to circumstances, and making him willing to go?
Perhaps not. The power of song can hardly be estimated. There is an
element about some poetry which is able to make even physical suffering
and death cheerful things to contemplate and consummations to be desired.
This element is present in the mortuary poetry of Philadelphia, and in a
noticeable degree of development.
The custom I have been treating of is one that should be adopted in all
the cities of the land.
It is said that once a man of small consequence died, and the Rev. T. K.
Beecher was asked to preach the funeral sermon—a man who abhors the
lauding of people, either dead or alive, except in dignified and simple
language, and then only for merits which they actually possessed or
possess, not merits which they merely ought to have possessed. The friends
of the deceased got up a stately funeral. They must have had misgivings that
the corpse might not be praised strongly enough, for they prepared some
manuscript headings and notes in which nothing was left unsaid on that
subject that a fervid imagination and an unabridged dictionary could
compile, and these they handed to the minister as he entered the pulpit.
They were merely intended as suggestions, and so the friends were filled
with consternation when the minister stood in the pulpit and proceeded to
read off the curious odds and ends in ghastly detail and in a loud voice! And
their consternation solidified to petrification when he paused at the end,
contemplated the multitude reflectively, and then said, impressively:
“The man would be a fool who tried to add anything to that. Let us
pray!”

And with the same strict adhesion to truth it can be said that the man
would be a fool who tried to add anything to the following transcendent
obituary poem. There is something so innocent, so guileless, so complacent,
so unearthly serene and self-satisfied about this peerless “hog-wash,” that
the man must be made of stone who can read it without a dulcet ecstasy
creeping along his backbone and quivering in his marrow. There is no need
to say that this poem is genuine and in earnest, for its proofs are written all
over its face. An ingenious scribbler might imitate it after a fashion, but
Shakespeare himself could not counterfeit it. It is noticeable that the
country editor who published it did not know that it was a treasure and the
most perfect thing of its kind that the storehouses and museums of literature
could show. He did not dare to say no to the dread poet—for such a poet
must have been something of an apparition—but he just shoveled it into his
paper anywhere that came handy, and felt ashamed, and put that disgusted
“Published by Request” over it, and hoped that his subscribers would
overlook it or not feel an impulse to read it:
(Published by Request)

LINES

Composed on the death of Samuel and Catharine Belknap's children
by M. A. Glaze

Friends and neighbors all draw near,
And listen to what I have to say;
And never leave your children dear
When they are small, and go away.

But always think of that sad fate,
That happened in year of '63;
Four children with a house did burn,
Think of their awful agony.

Their mother she had gone away,
And left them there alone to stay;
The house took fire and down did burn;
Before their mother did return.

Their piteous cry the neighbors heard,
And then the cry of fire was given;
But, ah! before they could them reach,
Their little spirits had flown to heaven.

Their father he to war had gone,
And on the battle-field was slain;

But little did he think when he went away,
But what on earth they would meet again.

The neighbors often told his wife
Not to leave his children there,
Unless she got some one to stay,
And of the little ones take care.

The oldest he was years not six,
And the youngest only eleven months old,
But often she had left them there alone,
As, by the neighbors, I have been told.

How can she bear to see the place.
Where she so oft has left them there,
Without a single one to look to them,
Or of the little ones to take good care.

Oh, can she look upon the spot,
Whereunder their little burnt bones lay,
But what she thinks she hears them say,
''Twas God had pity, and took us on high.'

And there may she kneel down and pray,
And ask God her to forgive;
And she may lead a different life
While she on earth remains to live.

Her husband and her children too,
God has took from pain and woe.
May she reform and mend her ways,
That she may also to them go.

And when it is God's holy will,
O, may she be prepared
To meet her God and friends in peace,
And leave this world of care.

1. Written in 1870.

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 traveling by rail all day today. However, tomorrow I don't
travel. Give me one for tomorrow.”
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 sha'n't need it. Lying at home in bed is
the thing I am afraid of.”
I had been looking into this matter. Last year I traveled twenty thousand
miles, almost entirely by rail; the year before, I traveled over twenty-five
thousand miles, half by sea and half by rail; and the year before that I
traveled in the neighborhood of ten thousand miles, exclusively by rail. I
suppose if I put in all the little odd journeys here and there, I may say I have
traveled sixty thousand miles during the three years I have mentioned. 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 the lot. I could read of
railway accidents every day—the newspaper atmosphere 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
suspicions 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 result was astounding. The peril
lay not in traveling, but in staying at home.
I hunted up statistics, and was amazed to find that after all the glaring
newspaper headlines 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 business 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 between New York and Rochester
the Erie ran eight passenger-trains each way every day—16 altogether; and
carried a daily average of 6,000 persons. That is about a million in six
months—the population of New York City. Well, the Erie kills from 13 to
23 persons of its million in six months; and in the same time 13,000 of New
York's million die in their beds! My flesh crept, my hair stood on end. “This
is appalling!” I said. “The danger isn't in traveling 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 scattered about the Union that do a prodigious passenger
business. Therefore it was fair to presume that an average of 2,500
passengers a day for each road in the country would be almost correct.
There are 846 railway lines in our country, and 846 times 2,500 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 beyond 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
hundred and ten millions at the very least. They 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
3,120 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 house-tops, breaking through church, or lecture-room floors,
taking patent medicines, or committing suicide in other forms. The Erie
railroad kills 23 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 that
appalling figure of 987,631 corpses, die naturally in their beds!
You will excuse me from taking any more chances on those beds. The
railroads are good 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!

PORTRAIT OF KING WILLIAM III
I never can look at those periodical portraits in The Galaxy magazine
without feeling a wild, tempestuous ambition to be an artist. I have 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
these portraits do.
There is a portrait of Monsignore Capel in the November number, now
could anything be sweeter than that? And there was Bismarck's, in the
October number; who can look at that without being purer and stronger and
nobler for it? And Thurlow and Weed's picture in the September number; I
would not have died without seeing that, no, not for anything this world can
give. But look back still further and recall my own likeness as printed in the
August number; 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 pillow every night, so that I can
go on studying 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 company are present I shuffle the portraits all
up together, and then pick them out one by one and call their names,
without referring to the printing on the bottom. I seldom make a mistake—
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 parlor. But first one thing and
then another interferes, 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 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 studying under De Mellville, the

house and portrait painter. (His name was Smith when he lived in the 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 Mellville several months now. The first
month I painted fences, and gave general satisfaction. The next month I
white-washed a barn. The third, I was doing tin roofs; the forth, 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 (see figure)—the
portrait of his Majesty William III., King of Prussia—is my fifth attempt in
portraits, and my greatest success. It has received unbounded praise from all
classes of the community, but that which gratifies me most is the frequent
and cordial verdict that it resembles the Galaxy portraits. Those were my
first love, my earliest admiration, the original source and incentive of my
art-ambition. Whatever I am in Art today, I owe to these portraits. I ask no
credit 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 me, if I had let him, but I never did. I always stated where I got the
idea.

King William wears large bushy side-whiskers, 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 epaulets both,
and so I let the whiskers go, and put in the epaulets, 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 endeavor to attract a
little attention to the Galaxy portraits. I feel persuaded 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
these portraits into universal favor, it is all I ask; the reading-matter will
take care of itself.

COMMENDATIONS OF THE PORTRAIT

There is nothing like it in the Vatican. <Pius IX.
It has none of that vagueness, that dreamy spirituality about it, which
many of the first critics of Arkansas have objected to in the 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 Bonheur.
The smile may be almost called unique. Bismarck.
I never saw such character portrayed in a picture face before. De
Mellville.
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.
Landseer.
One cannot see it without longing to contemplate the artist. Frederick
William.
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 awhile with Napoleon at Wilhelmshohe? It shall not cost you a cent.
William III.

DOES THE RACE OF MAN LOVE A LORD?
Often a quite assified remark becomes sanctified by use and
petrified by custom; it is then a permanency, its term of activity a
geologic period.

The day after the arrival of Prince Henry I met an English friend, and he
rubbed his hands and broke out with a remark that was charged to the brim
with joy—joy that was evidently a pleasant salve to an old sore place:
“Many a time I've had to listen without retort to an old saying that is
irritatingly true, and until now seemed to offer no chance for a return jibe:
'An Englishman does dearly love a lord'; but after this I shall talk back, and
say, 'How about the Americans?'”
It is a curious thing, the currency that an idiotic saying can get. The man
that first says it thinks he has made a discovery. The man he says it to,
thinks the same. It departs on its travels, is received everywhere with
admiring acceptance, and not only as a piece of rare and acute observation,
but as being exhaustively true and profoundly wise; and so it presently
takes its place in the world's list of recognized and established wisdoms,
and after that no one thinks of examining it to see whether it is really
entitled to its high honors or not. I call to mind instances of this in two well-
established proverbs, whose dullness is not surpassed by the one about the
Englishman and his love for a lord: one of them records the American's
Adoration of the Almighty Dollar, the other the American millionaire-girl's
ambition to trade cash for a title, with a husband thrown in.
It isn't merely the American that adores the Almighty Dollar, it is the
human race. The human race has always adored the hatful of shells, or the
bale of calico, or the half-bushel of brass rings, or the handful of steel fish-
hooks, or the houseful of black wives, or the zareba full of cattle, or the
two-score camels and asses, or the factory, or the farm, or the block of
buildings, or the railroad bonds, or the bank stock, or the hoarded cash, or—
anything that stands for wealth and consideration and independence, and
can secure to the possessor that most precious of all things, another man's
envy. It was a dull person that invented the idea that the American's
devotion to the dollar is more strenuous than another's.

Rich American girls do buy titles, but they did not invent that idea; it had
been worn threadbare several hundred centuries before America was
discovered. European girls still exploit it as briskly as ever; and, when a
title is not to be had for the money in hand, they buy the husband without it.
They must put up the “dot,” or there is no trade. The commercialization of
brides is substantially universal, except in America. It exists with us, to
some little extent, but in no degree approaching a custom.
“The Englishman dearly loves a lord.”
What is the soul and source of this love? I think the thing could be more
correctly worded:
“The human race dearly envies a lord.”
That is to say, it envies the lord's place. Why? On two accounts, I think:
its Power and its Conspicuousness.
Where Conspicuousness carries with it a Power which, by the light of our
own observation and experience, we are able to measure and comprehend, I
think our envy of the possessor is as deep and as passionate as is that of any
other nation. No one can care less for a lord than the backwoodsman, who
has had no personal contact with lords and has seldom heard them spoken
of; but I will not allow that any Englishman has a profounder envy of a lord
than has the average American who has lived long years in a European
capital and fully learned how immense is the position the lord occupies.
Of any ten thousand Americans who eagerly gather, at vast
inconvenience, to get a glimpse of Prince Henry, all but a couple of hundred
will be there out of an immense curiosity; they are burning up with desire to
see a personage who is so much talked about. They envy him; but it is
Conspicuousness they envy mainly, not the Power that is lodged in his royal
quality and position, for they have but a vague and spectral knowledge and
appreciation of that; through their environment and associations they have
been accustomed to regard such things lightly, and as not being very real;
consequently, they are not able to value them enough to consumingly envy
them.
But, whenever an American (or other human being) is in the presence, for
the first time, of a combination of great Power and Conspicuousness which
he thoroughly understands and appreciates, his eager curiosity and pleasure
will be well-sodden with that other passion—envy—whether he suspects it
or not. At any time, on any day, in any part of America, you can confer a

happiness upon any passing stranger by calling his attention to any other
passing stranger and saying:
“Do you see that gentleman going along there? It is Mr. Rockefeller.”
Watch his eye. It is a combination of power and conspicuousness which
the man understands.
When we understand rank, we always like to rub against it. When a man
is conspicuous, we always want to see him. Also, if he will pay us an
attention we will manage to remember it. Also, we will mention it now and
then, casually; sometimes to a friend, or if a friend is not handy, we will
make out with a stranger.
Well, then, what is rank, and what is conspicuousness? At once we think
of kings and aristocracies, and of world-wide celebrities in soldierships, the
arts, letters, etc., and we stop there. But that is a mistake. Rank holds its
court and receives its homage on every round of the ladder, from the
emperor down to the rat-catcher; and distinction, also, exists on every round
of the ladder, and commands its due of deference and envy.
To worship rank and distinction is the dear and valued privilege of all the
human race, and it is freely and joyfully exercised in democracies as well as
in monarchies—and even, to some extent, among those creatures whom we
impertinently call the Lower Animals. For even they have some poor little
vanities and foibles, though in this matter they are paupers as compared to
us.
A Chinese Emperor has the worship of his four hundred millions of
subjects, but the rest of the world is indifferent to him. A Christian Emperor
has the worship of his subjects and of a large part of the Christian world
outside of his domains; but he is a matter of indifference to all China. A
king, class A, has an extensive worship; a king, class B, has a less extensive
worship; class C, class D, class E get a steadily diminishing share of
worship; class L (Sultan of Zanzibar), class P (Sultan of Sulu), and class W
(half-king of Samoa), get no worship at all outside their own little patch of
sovereignty.
Take the distinguished people along down. Each has his group of
homage-payers. In the navy, there are many groups; they start with the
Secretary and the Admiral, and go down to the quartermaster—and below;
for there will be groups among the sailors, and each of these groups will
have a tar who is distinguished for his battles, or his strength, or his daring,

or his profanity, and is admired and envied by his group. The same with the
army; the same with the literary and journalistic craft; the publishing craft;
the cod-fishery craft; Standard Oil; U. S. Steel; the class A hotel—and the
rest of the alphabet in that line; the class A prize-fighter—and the rest of the
alphabet in his line—clear down to the lowest and obscurest six-boy gang
of little gamins, with its one boy that can thrash the rest, and to whom he is
king of Samoa, bottom of the royal race, but looked up to with a most
ardent admiration and envy.
There is something pathetic, and funny, and pretty, about this human
race's fondness for contact with power and distinction, and for the reflected
glory it gets out of it. The king, class A, is happy in the state banquet and
the military show which the emperor provides for him, and he goes home
and gathers the queen and the princelings around him in the privacy of the
spare room, and tells them all about it, and says:
“His Imperial Majesty put his hand upon my shoulder in the most
friendly way—just as friendly and familiar, oh, you can't imagine it!—and
everybody seeing him do it; charming, perfectly charming!”
The king, class G, is happy in the cold collation and the police parade
provided for him by the king, class B, and goes home and tells the family
all about it, and says:
“And His Majesty took me into his own private cabinet for a smoke and a
chat, and there we sat just as sociable, and talking away and laughing and
chatting, just the same as if we had been born in the same bunk; and all the
servants in the anteroom could see us doing it! Oh, it was too lovely for
anything!”
The king, class Q, is happy in the modest entertainment furnished him by
the king, class M, and goes home and tells the household about it, and is as
grateful and joyful over it as were his predecessors in the gaudier attentions
that had fallen to their larger lot.
Emperors, kings, artisans, peasants, big people, little people—at the
bottom we are all alike and all the same; all just alike on the inside, and
when our clothes are off, nobody can tell which of us is which. We are
unanimous in the pride we take in good and genuine compliments paid us,
and distinctions conferred upon us, in attentions shown. There is not one of
us, from the emperor down, but is made like that. Do I mean attentions
shown us by the guest? No, I mean simply flattering attentions, let them

come whence they may. We despise no source that can pay us a pleasing
attention—there is no source that is humble enough for that. You have heard
a dear little girl say to a frowzy and disreputable dog: “He came right to me
and let me pat him on the head, and he wouldn't let the others touch him!”
and you have seen her eyes dance with pride in that high distinction. You
have often seen that. If the child were a princess, would that random dog be
able to confer the like glory upon her with his pretty compliment? Yes; and
even in her mature life and seated upon a throne, she would still remember
it, still recall it, still speak of it with frank satisfaction. That charming and
lovable German princess and poet, Carmen Sylva, Queen of Roumania,
remembers yet that the flowers of the woods and fields “talked to her” when
she was a girl, and she sets it down in her latest book; and that the squirrels
conferred upon her and her father the valued compliment of not being afraid
of them; and “once one of them, holding a nut between its sharp little teeth,
ran right up against my father”—it has the very note of “He came right to
me and let me pat him on the head”—“and when it saw itself reflected in
his boot it was very much surprised, and stopped for a long time to
contemplate itself in the polished leather”—then it went its way. And the
birds! she still remembers with pride that “they came boldly into my room,”
when she had neglected her “duty” and put no food on the window-sill for
them; she knew all the wild birds, and forgets the royal crown on her head
to remember with pride that they knew her; also that the wasp and the bee
were personal friends of hers, and never forgot that gracious relationship to
her injury: “never have I been stung by a wasp or a bee.” And here is that
proud note again that sings in that little child's elation in being singled out,
among all the company of children, for the random dog's honor-conferring
attentions. “Even in the very worst summer for wasps, when, in lunching
out of doors, our table was covered with them and every one else was stung,
they never hurt me.”
When a queen whose qualities of mind and heart and character are able to
add distinction to so distinguished a place as a throne, remembers with
grateful exultation, after thirty years, honors and distinctions conferred
upon her by the humble, wild creatures of the forest, we are helped to
realize that complimentary attentions, homage, distinctions, are of no caste,
but are above all cast—that they are a nobility-conferring power apart.
We all like these things. When the gate-guard at the railway-station
passes me through unchallenged and examines other people's tickets, I feel

as the king, class A, felt when the emperor put the imperial hand on his
shoulder, “everybody seeing him do it”; and as the child felt when the
random dog allowed her to pat his head and ostracized the others; and as the
princess felt when the wasps spared her and stung the rest; and I felt just so,
four years ago in Vienna (and remember it yet), when the helmeted police
shut me off, with fifty others, from a street which the Emperor was to pass
through, and the captain of the squad turned and saw the situation and said
indignantly to that guard:
“Can't you see it is the Herr Mark Twain? Let him through!”
It was four years ago; but it will be four hundred before I forget the wind
of self-complacency that rose in me, and strained my buttons when I
marked the deference for me evoked in the faces of my fellow-rabble, and
noted, mingled with it, a puzzled and resentful expression which said, as
plainly as speech could have worded it: “And who in the nation is the Herr
Mark Twain um gotteswillen?”
How many times in your life have you heard this boastful remark:
“I stood as close to him as I am to you; I could have put out my hand and
touched him.”
We have all heard it many and many a time. It was a proud distinction to
be able to say those words. It brought envy to the speaker, a kind of glory;
and he basked in it and was happy through all his veins. And who was it he
stood so close to? The answer would cover all the grades. Sometimes it was
a king; sometimes it was a renowned highwayman; sometimes it was an
unknown man killed in an extraordinary way and made suddenly famous by
it; always it was a person who was for the moment the subject of public
interest of a village.
“I was there, and I saw it myself.” That is a common and envy-
compelling remark. It can refer to a battle; to a hanging; to a coronation; to
the killing of Jumbo by the railway-train; to the arrival of Jenny Lind at the
Battery; to the meeting of the President and Prince Henry; to the chase of a
murderous maniac; to the disaster in the tunnel; to the explosion in the
subway; to a remarkable dog-fight; to a village church struck by lightning.
It will be said, more or less causally, by everybody in America who has
seen Prince Henry do anything, or try to. The man who was absent and
didn't see him to anything, will scoff. It is his privilege; and he can make
capital out of it, too; he will seem, even to himself, to be different from

other Americans, and better. As his opinion of his superior Americanism
grows, and swells, and concentrates and coagulates, he will go further and
try to belittle the distinction of those that saw the Prince do things, and will
spoil their pleasure in it if he can. My life has been embittered by that kind
of person. If you are able to tell of a special distinction that has fallen to
your lot, it gravels them; they cannot bear it; and they try to make believe
that the thing you took for a special distinction was nothing of the kind and
was meant in quite another way. Once I was received in private audience by
an emperor. Last week I was telling a jealous person about it, and I could
see him wince under it, see him bite, see him suffer. I revealed the whole
episode to him with considerable elaboration and nice attention to detail.
When I was through, he asked me what had impressed me most. I said:
“His Majesty's delicacy. They told me to be sure and back out from the
presence, and find the door-knob as best I could; it was not allowable to
face around. Now the Emperor knew it would be a difficult ordeal for me,
because of lack of practice; and so, when it was time to part, he turned, with
exceeding delicacy, and pretended to fumble with things on his desk, so I
could get out in my own way, without his seeing me.”
It went home! It was vitriol! I saw the envy and disgruntlement rise in the
man's face; he couldn't keep it down. I saw him try to fix up something in
his mind to take the bloom off that distinction. I enjoyed that, for I judged
that he had his work cut out for him. He struggled along inwardly for quite
a while; then he said, with a manner of a person who has to say something
and hasn't anything relevant to say:
“You said he had a handful of special-brand cigars on the table?”
“Yes; I never saw anything to match them.”
I had him again. He had to fumble around in his mind as much as another
minute before he could play; then he said in as mean a way as I ever heard a
person say anything:
“He could have been counting the cigars, you know.”
I cannot endure a man like that. It is nothing to him how unkind he is, so
long as he takes the bloom off. It is all he cares for.
“An Englishman (or other human being) does dearly love a lord,” (or
other conspicuous person.) It includes us all. We love to be noticed by the
conspicuous person; we love to be associated with such, or with a

conspicuous event, even in a seventh-rate fashion, even in the forty-seventh,
if we cannot do better. This accounts for some of our curious tastes in
mementos. It accounts for the large private trade in the Prince of Wales's
hair, which chambermaids were able to drive in that article of commerce
when the Prince made the tour of the world in the long ago—hair which
probably did not always come from his brush, since enough of it was
marketed to refurnish a bald comet; it accounts for the fact that the rope
which lynches a negro in the presence of ten thousand Christian spectators
is salable five minutes later at two dollars and inch; it accounts for the
mournful fact that a royal personage does not venture to wear buttons on his
coat in public.
We do love a lord—and by that term I mean any person whose situation
is higher than our own. The lord of the group, for instance: a group of peers,
a group of millionaires, a group of hoodlums, a group of sailors, a group of
newsboys, a group of saloon politicians, a group of college girls. No royal
person has ever been the object of a more delirious loyalty and slavish
adoration than is paid by the vast Tammany herd to its squalid idol of
Wantage. There is not a bifurcated animal in that menagerie that would not
be proud to appear in a newspaper picture in his company. At the same
time, there are some in that organization who would scoff at the people who
have been daily pictured in company with Prince Henry, and would say
vigorously that they would not consent to be photographed with him—a
statement which would not be true in any instance. There are hundreds of
people in America who would frankly say to you that they would not be
proud to be photographed in a group with the Prince, if invited; and some of
these unthinking people would believe it when they said it; yet in no
instance would it be true. We have a large population, but we have not a
large enough one, by several millions, to furnish that man. He has not yet
been begotten, and in fact he is not begettable.
You may take any of the printed groups, and there isn't a person in the
dim background who isn't visibly trying to be vivid; if it is a crowd of ten
thousand—ten thousand proud, untamed democrats, horny-handed sons of
toil and of politics, and fliers of the eagle—there isn't one who is trying to
keep out of range, there isn't one who isn't plainly meditating a purchase of
the paper in the morning, with the intention of hunting himself out in the
picture and of framing and keeping it if he shall find so much of his person
in it as his starboard ear.

We all love to get some of the drippings of Conspicuousness, and we will
put up with a single, humble drip, if we can't get any more. We may pretend
otherwise, in conversation; but we can't pretend it to ourselves privately—
and we don't. We do confess in public that we are the noblest work of God,
being moved to it by long habit, and teaching, and superstition; but deep
down in the secret places of our souls we recognize that, if we are the
noblest work, the less said about it the better.
We of the North poke fun at the South for its fondness of titles—a
fondness for titles pure and simple, regardless of whether they are genuine
or pinchbeck. We forget that whatever a Southerner likes the rest of the
human race likes, and that there is no law of predilection lodged in one
people that is absent from another people. There is no variety in the human
race. We are all children, all children of the one Adam, and we love toys.
We can soon acquire that Southern disease if some one will give it a start. It
already has a start, in fact. I have been personally acquainted with over
eighty-four thousand persons who, at one time or another in their lives,
have served for a year or two on the staffs of our multitudinous governors,
and through that fatality have been generals temporarily, and colonels
temporarily, and judge-advocates temporarily; but I have known only nine
among them who could be hired to let the title go when it ceased to be
legitimate. I know thousands and thousands of governors who ceased to be
governors away back in the last century; but I am acquainted with only
three who would answer your letter if you failed to call them “Governor” in
it. I know acres and acres of men who have done time in a legislature in
prehistoric days, but among them is not half an acre whose resentment you
would not raise if you addressed them as “Mr.” instead of “Hon.” The first
thing a legislature does is to convene in an impressive legislative attitude,
and get itself photographed. Each member frames his copy and takes it to
the woods and hangs it up in the most aggressively conspicuous place in his
house; and if you visit the house and fail to inquire what that accumulation
is, the conversation will be brought around to it by that aforetime legislator,
and he will show you a figure in it which in the course of years he has
almost obliterated with the smut of his finger-marks, and say with a solemn
joy, “It's me!”
Have you ever seen a country Congressman enter the hotel breakfast-
room in Washington with his letters?—and sit at his table and let on to read
them?—and wrinkle his brows and frown statesman-like?—keeping a

furtive watch-out over his glasses all the while to see if he is being observed
and admired?—those same old letters which he fetches in every morning?
Have you seen it? Have you seen him show off? It is the sight of the
national capital. Except one; a pathetic one. That is the ex-Congressman:
the poor fellow whose life has been ruined by a two-year taste of glory and
of fictitious consequence; who has been superseded, and ought to take his
heartbreak home and hide it, but cannot tear himself away from the scene of
his lost little grandeur; and so he lingers, and still lingers, year after year,
unconsidered, sometimes snubbed, ashamed of his fallen estate, and
valiantly trying to look otherwise; dreary and depressed, but counterfeiting
breeziness and gaiety, hailing with chummy familiarity, which is not always
welcomed, the more-fortunates who are still in place and were once his
mates. Have you seen him? He clings piteously to the one little shred that is
left of his departed distinction—the “privilege of the floor”; and works it
hard and gets what he can out of it. That is the saddest figure I know of.
Yes, we do so love our little distinctions! And then we loftily scoff at a
Prince for enjoying his larger ones; forgetting that if we only had his chance
—ah! “Senator” is not a legitimate title. A Senator has no more right to be
addressed by it than have you or I; but, in the several state capitals and in
Washington, there are five thousand Senators who take very kindly to that
fiction, and who purr gratefully when you call them by it—which you may
do quite unrebuked. Then those same Senators smile at the self-constructed
majors and generals and judges of the South!
Indeed, we do love our distinctions, get them how we may. And we work
them for all they are worth. In prayer we call ourselves “worms of the
dust,” but it is only on a sort of tacit understanding that the remark shall not
be taken at par. We—worms of the dust! Oh, no, we are not that. Except in
fact; and we do not deal much in fact when we are contemplating ourselves.
As a race, we do certainly love a lord—let him be Croker, or a duke, or a
prize-fighter, or whatever other personage shall chance to be the head of our
group. Many years ago, I saw a greasy youth in overalls standing by the
Herald office, with an expectant look in his face. Soon a large man passed
out, and gave him a pat on the shoulder. That was what the boy was waiting
for—the large man's notice. The pat made him proud and happy, and the
exultation inside of him shone out through his eyes; and his mates were
there to see the pat and envy it and wish they could have that glory. The boy

belonged down cellar in the press-room, the large man was king of the
upper floors, foreman of the composing-room. The light in the boy's face
was worship, the foreman was his lord, head of his group. The pat was an
accolade. It was as precious to the boy as it would have been if he had been
an aristocrat's son and the accolade had been delivered by his sovereign
with a sword. The quintessence of the honor was all there; there was no
difference in values; in truth there was no difference present except an
artificial one—clothes.
All the human race loves a lord—that is, loves to look upon or be noticed
by the possessor of Power or Conspicuousness; and sometimes animals,
born to better things and higher ideals, descend to man's level in this matter.
In the Jardin des Plantes I have see a cat that was so vain of being the
personal friend of an elephant that I was ashamed of her.

EXTRACTS FROM ADAM'S DIARY
MONDAY.—This new creature with the long hair is a good deal in the
way. It is always hanging around and following me about. I don't like this; I
am not used to company. I wish it would stay with the other animals....
Cloudy today, wind in the east; think we shall have rain.... We? Where did I
get that word—the new creature uses it.
TUESDAY.—Been examining the great waterfall. It is the finest thing on
the estate, I think. The new creature calls it Niagara Falls—why, I am sure I
do not know. Says it looks like Niagara Falls. That is not a reason, it is mere
waywardness and imbecility. I get no chance to name anything myself. The
new creature names everything that comes along, before I can get in a
protest. And always that same pretext is offered—it looks like the thing.
There is a dodo, for instance. Says the moment one looks at it one sees at a
glance that it “looks like a dodo.” It will have to keep that name, no doubt.
It wearies me to fret about it, and it does no good, anyway. Dodo! It looks
no more like a dodo than I do.
WEDNESDAY.—Built me a shelter against the rain, but could not have it
to myself in peace. The new creature intruded. When I tried to put it out it
shed water out of the holes it looks with, and wiped it away with the back of
its paws, and made a noise such as some of the other animals make when
they are in distress. I wish it would not talk; it is always talking. That
sounds like a cheap fling at the poor creature, a slur; but I do not mean it so.
I have never heard the human voice before, and any new and strange sound
intruding itself here upon the solemn hush of these dreaming solitudes
offends my ear and seems a false note. And this new sound is so close to
me; it is right at my shoulder, right at my ear, first on one side and then on
the other, and I am used only to sounds that are more or less distant from
me.
FRIDAY. The naming goes recklessly on, in spite of anything I can do. I
had a very good name for the estate, and it was musical and pretty—Garden
Of Eden. Privately, I continue to call it that, but not any longer publicly. The
new creature says it is all woods and rocks and scenery, and therefore has
no resemblance to a garden. Says it looks like a park, and does not look like

anything but a park. Consequently, without consulting me, it has been new-
named Niagara Falls Park. This is sufficiently high-handed, it seems to me.
And already there is a sign up:

KEEP OFF THE GRASS

My life is not as happy as it was.
SATURDAY.—The new creature eats too much fruit. We are going to run
short, most likely. “We” again—that is its word; mine, too, now, from
hearing it so much. Good deal of fog this morning. I do not go out in the fog
myself. This new creature does. It goes out in all weathers, and stumps right
in with its muddy feet. And talks. It used to be so pleasant and quiet here.
SUNDAY.—Pulled through. This day is getting to be more and more
trying. It was selected and set apart last November as a day of rest. I had
already six of them per week before. This morning found the new creature
trying to clod apples out of that forbidden tree.
MONDAY.—The new creature says its name is Eve. That is all right, I
have no objections. Says it is to call it by, when I want it to come. I said it
was superfluous, then. The word evidently raised me in its respect; and
indeed it is a large, good word and will bear repetition. It says it is not an It,
it is a She. This is probably doubtful; yet it is all one to me; what she is
were nothing to me if she would but go by herself and not talk.
TUESDAY.—She has littered the whole estate with execrable names and
offensive signs:

This way to the Whirlpool

This way to Goat Island

Cave of the Winds this way

She says this park would make a tidy summer resort if there was any
custom for it. Summer resort—another invention of hers—just words,
without any meaning. What is a summer resort? But it is best not to ask her,
she has such a rage for explaining.

FRIDAY.—She has taken to beseeching me to stop going over the Falls.
What harm does it do? Says it makes her shudder. I wonder why; I have
always done it—always liked the plunge, and coolness. I supposed it was
what the Falls were for. They have no other use that I can see, and they
must have been made for something. She says they were only made for
scenery—like the rhinoceros and the mastodon.
I went over the Falls in a barrel—not satisfactory to her. Went over in a
tub—still not satisfactory. Swam the Whirlpool and the Rapids in a fig-leaf
suit. It got much damaged. Hence, tedious complaints about my
extravagance. I am too much hampered here. What I need is a change of
scene.
SATURDAY.—I escaped last Tuesday night, and traveled two days, and
built me another shelter in a secluded place, and obliterated my tracks as
well as I could, but she hunted me out by means of a beast which she has
tamed and calls a wolf, and came making that pitiful noise again, and
shedding that water out of the places she looks with. I was obliged to return
with her, but will presently emigrate again when occasion offers. She
engages herself in many foolish things; among others; to study out why the
animals called lions and tigers live on grass and flowers, when, as she says,
the sort of teeth they wear would indicate that they were intended to eat
each other. This is foolish, because to do that would be to kill each other,
and that would introduce what, as I understand, is called “death”; and death,
as I have been told, has not yet entered the Park. Which is a pity, on some
accounts.
SUNDAY.—Pulled through.
MONDAY.—I believe I see what the week is for: it is to give time to rest
up from the weariness of Sunday. It seems a good idea. ... She has been
climbing that tree again. Clodded her out of it. She said nobody was
looking. Seems to consider that a sufficient justification for chancing any
dangerous thing. Told her that. The word justification moved her admiration
—and envy, too, I thought. It is a good word.
TUESDAY.—She told me she was made out of a rib taken from my body.
This is at least doubtful, if not more than that. I have not missed any rib....
She is in much trouble about the buzzard; says grass does not agree with it;
is afraid she can't raise it; thinks it was intended to live on decayed flesh.