He Forgave Twain

1901

Many years ago the Montana club in Helena entertained Mark Twain after a lecture. He met many old friends there and one old enemy.

The latter had come all the way from Virginia City, Nev., on purpose to settle an old score. When the glasses were filled and Mark's health proposed, this man interrupted the proceedings by saying: "Hold on a minute. Before we go further I want to say to you, Sam Clemens, that you did me a dirty trick over there in Silver City, and I've come here to have a settlement with you."

There was a deathly silence for a moment, when Mark said in his deliberate drawl: "Let's see. That — was - before — I — reformed, wasn't — it?"

Senator Sanders suggested that inasmuch as the other fellow had never reformed Clemens and all the others present forgive him and drink together, which all did.

Life of "Mark Twain," Great American Humorist

Printed April 1910

Struggles, Adventures, Literary Work, Deaths, Financial Reverses

Samuel Langhorne Clemens, America's foremost humorist and known the world over as "Mark Twain" was born in the little town of Hannibal, Mo., on November 30, 1835.

His father, John Marshall Clemens, came from an old Virginia family, and with his young wife, Elizabeth Lampton, a descendant of the early settlers of Kentucky, he joined the sturdy band of pioneers who pushed over the Alleghenies in the early part of the last century and settled along the banks of the Mississippi river.

In the uncouth environment of the then little frontier town of Hannibal the famous author spent his boyhood days. Here he fished, hunted and lounged along the river banks with his sturdy companions, living a healthy outdoor existence, which undoubtedly accounted for his long life, in the face of his many afflictions.

He attended the little school, but not being of a very studious disposition, he learned far more from contact with the rough companions whom he immortalized in later years as "Huckleberry Finn" and "Tom Sawyer," and others of their type.

At the age of twelve his meager school education was brought to a sudden close by the death of his father.

His older brother, Orion S. Clemens, was the proprietor of a printing shop in the village, and young Sam Clemens began his journalistic career here as a "printer's devil." In the course of a few years he learned the trade as a compositor, and in 1853 he left his native town and began a wandering existence. He journeyed from place to place, working at his trade in New York and the principal cities of the middle west.

But while he gained a vast amount of experience during his travels, which proved of the greatest value in the preparation of some of his works in later years, this period was rather unprofitable from a financial standpoint, and he was finally compelled to return to his home along the banks of the great river, in rather straightened circumstance.

The life of a steamboat pilot had always appealed to his youthful imagination, and now that he had grown to manhood, he resolved to realize his ambition. He was fortunate enough to become a pupil of Horace Bixby, and he was soon guiding the awkward river craft along the tortuous channel of the muddy stream.

The idea of his becoming an author had never entered his mind at that time, but he absorbed enough of the pilot life to enable him to describe the difficulties encountered in guiding a boat along the great river in his "Life on the Mississippi River," which he wrote many years later.

First Literary Work

In 1862 he began his first regular literary work on the staff of the Virginia City Enterprise. He wrote a column daily, dealing with the political situation in the state, that attracted wide attention. These articles he signed with the nom de plume "Mark Twain," which he had heard sung out on the Mississippi steamers to let the pilot know that the sounding showed two fathoms of water.

In March of 1867, "Twain" published his first book, "The Jumping Frog of Calaveras County." The book made quite a stir in that part of the country, but only 4,000 copies were sold. It attracted the attention, however, of the editor of the Alta California, who sent the author out as a newspaper correspondent on a steamboat excursion to southern Europe and the Orient.

His letters were published from time to time, and in 1869 the author revised them and published them in book form under the title of "The Innocents Abroad." This work made "Mark Twain" famous and compelled his recognition as America's foremost humorist. In the first 16 months, 85,000 volumes were sold, and many more subsequently. This was a record sale for those days.

Marries Miss Langdon

It was on his trip in the Mediterranean that "Mark Twain" met Olivia L. Langdon of Elmira, N. Y. They fell in love with each other, and in 1870 were married. Their married life was one of perfect harmony and four children blessed their union.

Mr. Clemens resided in Buffalo for a year after his marriage, and was nominally the editor of the Buffalo Express. In 1871 he joined the literary colony at Hartford, Conn., where he lived for a great many years, and where he did the greater part of the work that has made his name immortal.

In 1872 "Roughing It" appeared, and in the same year "The Gilded Age," written in collaboration with Charles Dudley Warner, was published. "Tom Sawyer" came in 1876, and "Huckleberry Finn" nine years later. Of the stories with an historical setting "The Prince and the Pauper," "A Connecticut Yankee at the Court of King Arthur," and "Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc," appeared in 1882, 1890 and 1894, respectively. In 1893 that curious philosopher, "Pudd'nhead Wilson." made his bow.

Misfortune Dogs Him

But while the great humorist was meeting with well-deserved success from a literary standpoint, the imps of misfortune seemed to dog his very footsteps.

In 1884 he conceived the idea of reaping the publisher's as well as the author's profits from some of his works. Accordingly he organized a stock company known as C. L. Webster & Co., in which he was the largest stockholder, to publish his works. He had accumulated considerable wealth and was rated as a millionaire.

His financial ability, however, was none of the best, and in 1894 his entire fortune was swept away by the failure of the publishing house. Mr. Clemens was abroad at the time, and although 60 years of age, he started out on a tour of the globe, delivering lectures and writing articles in order to pay the debts of the defunct firm.

He had scarcely begun his great task when fate struck him another hard blow. This was the death of his eldest and most accomplished daughter, Miss Olivia S. Clemens, who died in August, 1896, at the age of 24. Broken in spirit, he continued his great task and in two years he had paid off his debts.

Wife Passes Away

As if in sympathy with her husband's misfortunes, his wife's health began to fail. He moved to Florence, Italy, in the hope that the mild climate would restore her, but it proved of no avail, and on November 6, 1904, she died in that far off land.

About this time the humorist met H. H. Rogers, the Standard Oil magnate, and the men became fast friends. Rogers gave his literary friend the aid of his financial experience, and Clemens was soon in possession of a comfortable income.

And now misfortune selected another weapon with which to attack the white-haired author. Heretofore his books had escaped harsh criticisms, but in November, 1907, "Tom Sawyer" and "Huckleberry Finn," his boy masterpieces, were withheld from youths by the Brooklyn public libraries, as "unfit for young minds." Comptroller Joy of Detroit, Mich., declared his work, "A Double-Barrelled Detective Story," was "literary junk, unfit for a public library," and a Massachusetts public library refused to give shelf room to his "Eve's Diary," declaring that the book was "shocking."

Worn out by his lectures, after dinner speeches and misfortunes, "Twain" purchased a farm in Redding, Conn., and erected a $40,000 villa, which he called "Stormfield." With his two daughters, Clara and Jean, he moved there in 1908, and settled down to a life of ease.

But a series of fresh misfortunes was in store for him. He had vigorously denounced the rule of the late King Leopold II in the Kongo Free State, and just when the reform movement was at its height, his ill health compelled him to abandon his work.

The "Children's Theater," which was founded by "Mark Twain" in New York, and which represented one of his life-long ambitions, was forced to close through lack of funds.

Then the humorist and his daughter Clara became involved in a lawsuit over a farm which he had presented to his former secretary, Mrs. Ralph Ashcroft, on her wedding day; and which he later attached on the advice of his daughter.

The facts regarding this disagreeable affair were aired in the press, much to the humiliation of the veteran humorist.

In the early part of 1909 his stanch friend and adviser, H. H. Rogers, died suddenly at his New York home. This great financier and the white haired humorist had been inseparable companions for a number of years. They had made trips to Bermuda together, and when Rogers opened his railroad in Virginia, "Twain" was one of the guests of honor. The author was greatly affected by the financier's sudden death.

In the latter part of 1909, "Twain" made another trip to Bermuda, and on his return his feeble appearance attracted a great deal of attention. Then the last crushing blow came the day before Christmas, when his youngest daughter, Jean, was found dead in the bathtub at his Redding home. The young woman had been a victim of epileptic fits.

Note: This article is a from a paper published on April 20, 1910. Mark Twain died the next day.

First Money Mark Twain Earned

1906

Marshall P. Wilder, in his book entitled The Sunny Side of the Street, says that he once asked Mark Twain if he could remember the first money he had ever earned.

"Yes," replied the famous humorist, "it was at school. There was a rule in our school that any boy marring his desk either with pencil or knife, would he chastised publicly before the whole school or pay a fine of $5.

"One day I had to tell my father that I had broken the rule, and had to pay a fine or take a public whipping, and he said:

" 'Sam, it would be too bad to have the name of Clemens disgraced before the whole school, so I'll pay the fine. But I don't want you to lose anything, so come upstairs.'

"I went upstairs with father and came down again feeling a tender spot with one hand and $5 in the other, and decided that as I had been punished once and got used to it, I wouldn't mind taking the other licking at school. So I did, and I kept the $5."

Mark Twain's Eulogy of Hawley

1910

One Speech Humorist Was Known to Make Certainly a Gem in Its Way

It is said that Mark Twain has made only one public appearance as a political speaker, which was during a presidential campaign some years ago. While visiting in Elmira, N. Y., in the fall of that year, he made a short speech, introducing Gen. Hawley of Connecticut to a Republican meeting. Among other things he said:

"Gen. Hawley is a member of my church in Hartford, and the author of 'Beautiful Snow.' Maybe he will deny that; but I am here only to give him a character from his last place. As a pure citizen I respect him; as a personal friend of years, I have the warmest regard for him; as a neighbor whose vegetable garden intimately adjoins mine, why — why I watch him.

"As the author of 'Beautiful Snow,' he added a new pang to winter. He is a square, true man in honest politics — and I must say that he occupies a mighty lonesome position. So broad, so bountiful is his character, that he never turned a tramp empty handed from the door — but always gave him a letter of introduction to me.

"Pure, honest, incorruptible, that is Joe Hawley. Such a man in politics is like a bottle of perfumery in a glue factory; it may moderate the stench; but it can't eliminate it. "In conclusion let me say that I haven't said any more of him than I would of myself. Ladies and gentlemen, this is Gen. Hawley." — The Sunday Magazine.

Mark Twain In Serious Mood on Marriage and Life

1909

MARK TWAIN IN SERIOUS MOOD.

Mark Twain, who can be serious when occasion requires, gave out a serious interview on the occasion of the recent marriage of his daughter. Twain didn't jest over the event. To him the union of two lives, the institution of a new family, was too sacred a thing to be made a subject for pun and jest. If marriages were more generally viewed in such a sacred light there might be fewer cases for the divorce court, fewer scandals, and fewer family "jars."

Twain declared a happy marriage is one of the tragical things of life. That, at first glance, appears like a contradiction. But it isn't. The happiest marriage is a tragedy, because, as Twain says, the future is filled to the brim with uncertainties. The very uncertainty of life is in itself a tragedy.

—The Cedar Rapids Evening Gazette, Cedar Rapids, IA, Oct. 9, 1909, p. 4

Ten Benefits of Literature Named by Brown in Talk

1922

"Literature — Why Study It," is Subject of English Lecture

"Literature is the textbook on human nature," said H. G. Brown, instructor in English, Tuesday afternoon at the Law building in his lecture on "Literature — Why Study It." Ten benefits which can be derived from reading literature were given. "Knowledge of human nature is acquired better through familiarity with the masterpieces than even real life," Brown declared. Brown, who explained that one can associate with a man for month without knowing him as well as you could know Macbeth or Hamlet in four hours. "Literature gives all the significant details of a man's life in complete sequence, while real life gives only glimpses."

"Literature is a cure for provincialism. With this as the medium we may travel and know the world from the Moab of Ruth to the Mississippi Valley of Tom Sawyer," said Mr. Brown. "We may travel back over great periods of time and know the common people of the fourteenth century through Chaucer's Prologue. We may travel up and down through unfamiliar society."

—The Capital Times, Madison, Wisconsin, July 27, 1922, page 8.

Keeping Private Letters Private: Burn Them

1912

Wise Man

Once upon a time a wise man penned a letter full of confidential statements, and at the end he wrote a line, heavily underscored: "Burn this letter." Then, being a wise man, he took his own advice and burned the letter himself.


Gift That Is Divine

If instead of a gem, or even a flower, we could cast the gift of a lovely thought into the heart of a friend, that would be giving as the angels must give — George MacDonald.


Jane Austen Unpopular

It has been pointed out with some surprise that the late W. S. Gilbert had a strong dislike for Jane Austen, but a correspondent of the New York Evening Post reminds us that Mark Twain had a similar antipathy. He said once that "a library that does not contain Jane Austen's works is a good library, even if it hasn't another book in it."


Have Enjoyed Long Life

Living in the Isle of Wight is a family of three brothers and two sisters who are all in receipt of the old age pension, and whose combined ages total 387 years. The veteran of the family is Mrs. Ann Harris of Cowes, aged eighty-four; the "baby" of the family is Mr. Robert Butt of Niton, who has seen only seventy-two summers.

—The Daily Commonwealth, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, December 17, 1912, page 11.

General Sherman, Mark Twain Address Crowds from Train

1912

SET TWAIN AT "WORK"

HOW GEN. SHERMAN MADE HUMORIST PAY FARE

Author Compelled to Pose as Famous Soldier While the Latter Smoked Contentedly in His Private Car

Albert Bigelow Paine tells of the time when Mark Twain on his way to West Point to deliver an address found himself in the same train with General Sherman, who had been attending a dinner in Hartford.

"A pleasant incident followed, which Clemens himself used to relate. Gen. Sherman attended the banquet and Secretary of War Robert Lincoln. Next morning Clemens and Twichell were leaving for West Point, where they were to address the military students, guests on the same special train on which Lincoln and Sherman had their private car. This car was at the end of the train, and when the two passengers reached the station Sherman and Lincoln were out on the rear platform addressing the multitude. Clemens and Twichell went and, taking seats, waited for them.

"As the speakers finished the train started, but they still remained outside, bowing and waving to the assembled citizens, so that it was under good headway before they came in. Sherman came up to Clemens, who sat smoking unconcernedly.

"'Well,' he said, 'who told you you could go in this car?'

"'Nobody,' said Clemens.

"'Do you expect to pay extra fare?' asked Sherman.

"'No,' said Clemens; 'I didn't expect to pay any fare.'

"'O, you don't! Then you'll work your way.'

"Sherman took off his coat and military hat and made Clemens put them on.

"'Now,' said he, 'whenever the train stops you get out on the platform and represent me and make a speech.'

"It was not long before the train stopped and Clemens, according to orders, stepped out on the rear platform and bowed to the crowd. There was a cheer at the sight of his military uniform. Then the cheer waned, became a murmur of uncertainty, followed by an undertone of discussion. Presently somebody said:

"'Say, that ain't Sherman; that's Mark Twain,' which brought another cheer.

"Then Sherman had to come out, too, and the result was that both spoke. They kept this up at the different stations and sometimes Robert Lincoln came out with them, and when there was time all three spoke, much the satisfaction of their audiences." —Harper's Weekly.

—The Daily Commonwealth, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, December 17, 1912, page 2.

Mark Twain's Home Robbed

Redding, Connecticut, 1908
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Mark Twain's residence at Redding, Conn., was robbed one night last week, and the only joke about it was, that both burglars were caught after an exciting chase, and some shooting.

--The Dothan Eagle, Dothan, Alabama, September 21, 1908, page 2.


Dothan, Alabama, 1908
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If Drift Armstrong would only come to Dothan, and see our charming beauties, he would cease to rave about those blond-dyed damsels, with made-to-order complexions, of Montgomery.

--The Dothan Eagle, Dothan, Alabama, September 22, 1908, page 2.


WORDS OF WISDOM

He who flatters you is your enemy.— Cardan.

In all things it is better to hope than despair.—Goethe.

There is no index of character so sure as the voice.—Disraeli.

Idleness travels very slowly, and poverty soon overtakes her.—Hunter.

Adversity borrows its sharpest sting from our impatience.—Bishop Horne.

Laughing cheerfulness throws sunlight on all the paths of life.—Richter.

There is no calamity which right words will not begin to redress.—Emerson.

To forgive a fault in another is more sublime than to be faultless one's self. —George Sand.

He alone is an acute observer who can observe minutely without being observed.—Lavater.

Experience is a keen knife that hurts; while it extracts the cataract that binds.—De Linod.

If the ancients left us ideas, to our credit be it spoken, we moderns are building houses for them.—A. B. Alcott.

Money dishonestly acquired is never worth its cost, while a good conscience never costs as much as it is worth.— J. P. Seun.

The one who will be found in trial capable of great acts of love is ever the one who is always doing considerate small ones.—F. W. Robertson.

To be humble to superiors is duty; to equals, is courtesy; to inferiors, is nobleness; and to all, safety; it being a virtue that, for all its lowliness, commandeth those it stoops to.—Sir. T. Moore.

--Daily Vineyardist, Penn Yan, New York, September 23, 1903, page 2.


Mississippi River, 1903
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Mississippi Houseboats

There is an especial charm about life on a houseboat on the Mississippi. Unlike houseboats on most bodies of water, they can land whenever they will and enjoy any chance pleasure by the way. Cities are in easy reach, and even a theatre party can be indulged in at short notice. Between St. Paul and St. Louis seven magnificent rivers can be reached by boats passing through more than that number of States.

From Lacrosse to St. Louis houseboats meet the eye every few minutes. At every town along the river one sees boats lying on the shore. They are usually moored in little bays, with their launches alongside and shaded by the overhanging branches of trees. When a steamer passes the occupants appear at the doors and windows, and sometimes go to the upper deck to wave their greetings. The water is very high at present, and the boats fit in so perfectly that the lovely green foliage seems to have grown in anticipation of the coming of each particular boat. Many of the river islands are submerged and the trees seem to shoot up from the water.

Numerous houseboats are in course of construction along the rivers. Many are to be used by their owners to visit the St. Louis Exposition next year.— Minneapolis Journal.

--Daily Vineyardist, Penn Yan, New York, September 23, 1903, page 2.