The Letters Of Mark Twain, Complete

M >> Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) >> The Letters Of Mark Twain, Complete


I had an engagement at a beautiful dwelling close to the Players for
10.30; I was there by 10.45. Thirty cultivated and very musical ladies
and gentlemen present--all of them acquaintances and many of them
personal friends of mine. That wonderful Hungarian Band was there (they
charge $500 for an evening.) Conversation and Band until midnight; then a
bite of supper; then the company was compactly grouped before me and I
told about Dr. B. E. Martin and the etchings, and followed it with the
Scotch-Irish Christening. My, but the Martin is a darling story! Next,
the head tenor from the Opera sang half a dozen great songs that set the
company wild, yes, mad with delight, that nobly handsome young Damrosch
accompanying on the piano.

Just a little pause--then the Band burst out into an explosion of weird
and tremendous dance music, a Hungarian celebrity and his wife took the
floor--I followed; I couldn't help it; the others drifted in, one by one,
and it was Onteora over again.

By half past 4 I had danced all those people down--and yet was not tired;
merely breathless. I was in bed at 5, and asleep in ten minutes. Up at
9 and presently at work on this letter to you. I think I wrote until 2
or half past. Then I walked leisurely out to Mr. Rogers's (it is called
3 miles but it is short of it) arriving at 3.30, but he was out
--to return at 5.30--(and a person was in, whom I don't particularly like)
--so I didn't stay, but dropped over and chatted with the Howellses until
6.

First, Howells and I had a chat together. I asked about Mrs. H. He said
she was fine, still steadily improving, and nearly back to her old best
health. I asked (as if I didn't know):

"What do you attribute this strange miracle to?"

"Mind-cure--simply mind-cure."

"Lord, what a conversion! You were a scoffer three months ago."

"I? I wasn't."

"You were. You made elaborate fun of me in this very room."

"I did not, Clemens."

"It's a lie, Howells, you did."

I detailed to him the conversation of that time--with the stately
argument furnished by Boyesen in the fact that a patient had actually
been killed by a mind-curist; and Howells's own smart remark that when
the mind-curist is done with you, you have to call in a "regular" at last
because the former can't procure you a burial permit.

At last he gave in--he said he remembered that talk, but had now been a
mind-curist so long it was difficult for him to realize that he had ever
been anything else.

Mrs. H. came skipping in, presently, the very person, to a dot, that she
used to be, so many years ago.

Mrs. H. said: "People may call it what they like, but it is just
hypnotism, and that's all it is--hypnotism pure and simple. Mind-cure!
--the idea! Why, this woman that cured me hasn't got any mind. She's a
good creature, but she's dull and dumb and illiterate and--"

"Now Eleanor!"

"I know what I'm talking about!--don't I go there twice a week? And Mr.
Clemens, if you could only see her wooden and satisfied face when she
snubs me for forgetting myself and showing by a thoughtless remark that
to me weather is still weather, instead of being just an abstraction and
a superstition--oh, it's the funniest thing you ever saw! A-n-d-when she
tilts up her nose-well, it's--it's--Well it's that kind of a nose that--"

"Now Eleanor!--the woman is not responsible for her nose--" and so-on and
so-on. It didn't seem to me that I had any right to be having this feast
and you not there.

She convinced me before she got through, that she and William James are
right--hypnotism and mind-cure are the same thing; no difference between
them. Very well; the very source, the very center of hypnotism is Paris.
Dr. Charcot's pupils and disciples are right there and ready to your hand
without fetching poor dear old Susy across the stormy sea. Let Mrs.
Mackay (to whom I send my best respects), tell you whom to go to to learn
all you need to learn and how to proceed. Do, do it, honey. Don't lose
a minute.

.....At 11 o'clock last night Mr. Rogers said:

"I am able to feel physical fatigue--and I feel it now. You never show
any, either in your eyes or your movements; do you ever feel any?"

I was able to say that I had forgotten what that feeling was like. Don't
you remember how almost impossible it was for me to tire myself at the
Villa? Well, it is just so in New York. I go to bed unfatigued at 3,
I get up fresh and fine six hours later. I believe I have taken only one
daylight nap since I have been here.

When the anchor is down, then I shall say:

"Farewell--a long farewell--to business! I will never touch it again!"

I will live in literature, I will wallow in it, revel in it, I will swim
in ink! Joan of Arc--but all this is premature; the anchor is not down
yet.

To-morrow (Tuesday) I will add a P. S. if I've any to add; but, whether
or no, I must mail this to morrow, for the mail steamer goes next day.

5.30 p. m. Great Scott, this is Tuesday! I must rush this letter into
the mail instantly.

Tell that sassy Ben I've got her welcome letter, and I'll write her as
soon as I get a daylight chance. I've most time at night, but I'd
druther write daytimes.
SAML.


The Reid and Simmons mentioned in the foregoing were Robert Reid and
Edward Simmons, distinguished painter--the latter a brilliant,
fluent, and industrious talker. The title; "Fire-escape Simmons,"
which Clemens gives him, originated when Oliver Herford, whose
quaint wit has so long delighted New-Yorkers, one day pinned up by
the back door of the Players the notice: "Exit in case of Simmons."
Gwen, a popular novel of that day, was written by Blanche Willis
Howard.

"Jamie" Dodge, in the next letter, was the son of Mrs. Mary Mapes
Dodge, editor of St. Nicholas.


To Clara Clemens, in Paris:

MR. ROGERS'S OFFICE, Feb. 5, '94.
Dear Benny--I was intending to answer your letter to-day, but I am away
down town, and will simply whirl together a sentence or two for
good-fellowship. I have bought photographs of Coquelin and Jane Hading
and will ask them to sign them. I shall meet Coquelin tomorrow night,
and if Hading is not present I will send her picture to her by somebody.

I am to breakfast with Madame Nordica in a few days, and meantime I hope
to get a good picture of her to sign. She was of the breakfast company
yesterday, but the picture of herself which she signed and gave me does
not do her majestic beauty justice.

I am too busy to attend to the photo-collecting right, because I have to
live up to the name which Jamie Dodge has given me--the "Belle of New
York"--and it just keeps me rushing. Yesterday I had engagements to
breakfast at noon, dine at 3, and dine again at 7. I got away from the
long breakfast at 2 p. m., went and excused myself from the 3 o'clock
dinner, then lunched with Mrs. Dodge in 58th street, returned to the
Players and dressed, dined out at 9, and was back at Mrs. Dodge's at
10 p. m. where we had magic-lantern views of a superb sort, and a lot of
yarns until an hour after midnight, and got to bed at 2 this morning
--a good deal of a gain on my recent hours. But I don't get tired; I
sleep as sound as a dead person, and always wake up fresh and strong
--usually at exactly 9.

I was at breakfast lately where people of seven separate nationalities
sat and the seven languages were going all the time. At my side sat
a charming gentleman who was a delightful and active talker, and
interesting. He talked glibly to those folks in all those seven
languages and still had a language to spare! I wanted to kill him, for
very envy.

I greet you with love and kisses.
PAPA.


To Mrs. Clemens, in Paris:

Feb.--.
Livy dear, last night I played billiards with Mr. Rogers until 11, then
went to Robert Reid's studio and had a most delightful time until 4 this
morning. No ladies were invited this time. Among the people present
were--

Coquelin;
Richard Harding Davis;
Harrison, the great out-door painter;
Wm. H. Chase, the artist;
Bettini, inventor of the new phonograph.
Nikola Tesla, the world-wide illustrious electrician; see article about
him in Jan. or Feb. Century.
John Drew, actor;
James Barnes, a marvelous mimic; my, you should see him!
Smedley the artist;
Zorn the artist;
Zogbaum the artist;
Reinhart the artist;
Metcalf the artist;
Ancona, head tenor at the Opera;

Oh, a great lot of others. Everybody there had done something and was in
his way famous.

Somebody welcomed Coquelin in a nice little French speech; John Drew did
the like for me in English, and then the fun began. Coquelin did some
excellent French monologues--one of them an ungrammatical Englishman
telling a colorless historiette in French. It nearly killed the fifteen
or twenty people who understood it.

I told a yarn, Ancona sang half a dozen songs, Barnes did his darling
imitations, Harding Davis sang the hanging of Danny Deever, which was of
course good, but he followed it with that most fascinating (for what
reason I don't know) of all Kipling's poems, "On the Road to Mandalay,"
sang it tenderly, and it searched me deeper and charmed me more than the
Deever.

Young Gerrit Smith played some ravishing dance music and we all danced
about an hour. There couldn't be a pleasanter night than that one was.
Some of those people complained of fatigue but I don't seem to know what
the sense of fatigue is.

Coquelin talks quite good English now. He said:

"I have a brother who has the fine mind--ah, a charming and delicate
fancy, and he knows your writings so well, and loves them--and that is
the same with me. It will stir him so when I write and tell him I have
seen you!"

Wasn't that nice? We talked a good deal together. He is as winning as
his own face. But he wouldn't sign that photograph for Clara. "That?
No! She shall have a better one. I will send it to you."

He is much driven, and will forget it, but Reid has promised to get the
picture for me, and I will try and keep him reminded.

Oh, dear, my time is all used up and your letters are not answered.

Mama, dear, I don't go everywhere--I decline most things. But there are
plenty that I can't well get out of.

I will remember what you say and not make my yarning too common.

I am so glad Susy has gone on that trip and that you are trying the
electric. May you both prosper. For you are mighty dear to me and in my
thoughts always.
SAML.


The affairs of the Webster Publishing Company were by this time
getting into a very serious condition indeed. The effects of the
panic of the year before could not be overcome. Creditors were
pressing their claims and profits were negligible. In the following
letter we get a Mark Twain estimate of the great financier who so
cheerfully was willing to undertake the solving of Mark Twain's
financial problems.


To Mrs. Clemens, in Paris:

THE PLAYERS, Feb. 15, '94. 11.30 p. m.
Livy darling, Yesterday I talked all my various matters over with Mr.
Rogers and we decided that it would be safe for me to leave here the 7th
of March, in the New York. So his private secretary, Miss Harrison,
wrote and ordered a berth for me and then I lost no time in cabling you
that I should reach Southampton March 14, and Paris the 15th. Land, but
it made my pulses leap, to think I was going to see you again!...
One thing at a time. I never fully laid Webster's disastrous condition
before Mr. Rogers until to-night after billiards. I did hate to burden
his good heart and over-worked head with it, but he took hold with
avidity and said it was no burden to work for his friends, but a
pleasure. We discussed it from various standpoints, and found it a
sufficiently difficult problem to solve; but he thinks that after he has
slept upon it and thought it over he will know what to suggest.

You must not think I am ever rude with Mr. Rogers, I am not. He is not
common clay, but fine--fine and delicate--and that sort do not call out
the coarsenesses that are in my sort. I am never afraid of wounding him;
I do not need to watch myself in that matter. The sight of him is peace.

He wants to go to Japan--it is his dream; wants to go with me--which
means, the two families--and hear no more about business for awhile, and
have a rest. And he needs it. But it is like all the dreams of all busy
men--fated to remain dreams.

You perceive that he is a pleasant text for me. It is easy to write
about him. When I arrived in September, lord how black the prospect was
--how desperate, how incurably desperate! Webster and Co. had to have a
small sum of money or go under at once. I flew to Hartford--to my
friends--but they were not moved, not strongly interested, and I was
ashamed that I went. It was from Mr. Rogers, a stranger, that I got the
money and was by it saved. And then--while still a stranger--he set
himself the task of saving my financial life without putting upon me (in
his native delicacy) any sense that I was the recipient of a charity,
a benevolence--and he has accomplished that task; accomplished it at a
cost of three months of wearing and difficult labor. He gave that time
to me--time which could not be bought by any man at a hundred thousand
dollars a month--no, nor for three times the money.

Well, in the midst of that great fight, that long and admirable fight,
George Warner came to me and said:

"There is a splendid chance open to you. I know a man--a prominent man
--who has written a book that will go like wildfire; a book that arraigns
the Standard Oil fiends, and gives them unmitigated hell, individual by
individual. It is the very book for you to publish; there is a fortune
in it, and I can put you in communication with the author."

I wanted to say:

"The only man I care for in the world; the only man I would give a damn
for; the only man who is lavishing his sweat and blood to save me and
mine from starvation and shame, is a Standard Oil fiend. If you know me,
you know whether I want the book or not."

But I didn't say that. I said I didn't want any book; I wanted to get
out of the publishing business and out of all business, and was here for
that purpose and would accomplish it if I could.

But there's enough. I shall be asleep by 3, and I don't need much sleep,
because I am never drowsy or tired these days. Dear, dear Susy my
strength reproaches me when I think of her and you, my darling.

SAML.


But even so able a man as Henry Rogers could not accomplish the
impossible. The affairs of the Webster Company were hopeless, the
business was not worth saving. By Mr. Rogers's advice an assignment
was made April, 18, 1894. After its early spectacular success less
than ten years had brought the business to failure. The publication
of the Grant memoirs had been its only great achievement.

Clemens would seem to have believed that the business would resume,
and for a time Rogers appears to have comforted him in his hope, but
we cannot believe that it long survived. Young Hall, who had made
such a struggle for its salvation, was eager to go on, but he must
presently have seen the futility of any effort in that direction.

Of course the failure of Mark Twain's firm made a great stir in the
country, and it is easy to understand that loyal friends would rally
in his behalf.


To Mrs. Clemens, in Paris:

April 22, '94.
Dear old darling, we all think the creditors are going to allow us to
resume business; and if they do we shall pull through and pay the debts.
I am prodigiously glad we made an assignment. And also glad that we did
not make it sooner. Earlier we should have made a poor showing; but now
we shall make a good one.

I meet flocks of people, and they all shake me cordially by the hand and
say "I was so sorry to hear of the assignment, but so glad you did it.
It was around, this long time, that the concern was tottering, and all
your friends were afraid you would delay the assignment too long."

John Mackay called yesterday, and said, "Don't let it disturb you, Sam
--we all have to do it, at one time or another; it's nothing to be
ashamed of."

One stranger out in New York State sent me a dollar bill and thought
he would like to get up a dollar-subscription for me. And Poultney
Bigelow's note came promptly, with his check for $1,000. I had been
meeting him every day at the Club and liking him better and better all
the time. I couldn't take his money, of course, but I thanked him
cordially for his good will.

Now and then a good and dear Joe Twichell or Susy Warner condoles with me
and says "Cheer up--don't be downhearted," and some other friend says,
"I am glad and surprised to see how cheerful you are and how bravely you
stand it"--and none of them suspect what a burden has been lifted from me
and how blithe I am inside. Except when I think of you, dear heart--then
I am not blithe; for I seem to see you grieving and ashamed, and dreading
to look people in the face. For in the thick of the fight there is
cheer, but you are far away and cannot hear the drums nor see the
wheeling squadrons. You only seem to see rout, retreat, and dishonored
colors dragging in the dirt--whereas none of these things exist. There
is temporary defeat, but no dishonor--and we will march again. Charley
Warner said to-day, "Sho, Livy isn't worrying. So long as she's got you
and the children she doesn't care what happens. She knows it isn't her
affair." Which didn't convince me.

Good bye my darling, I love you and all of the kids--and you can tell
Clara I am not a spitting gray kitten.
SAML.


Clemens sailed for Europe as soon as his affairs would permit him
to go. He must get settled where he could work comfortably.
Type-setter prospects seemed promising, but meantime there was
need of funds.

He began writing on the ship, as was his habit, and had completed
his article on Fenimore Cooper by the time he reached London. In
August we find him writing to Mr. Rogers from Etretat, a little
Norman watering-place.


To H. H. Rogers, in New York:

ETRETAT, (NORMANDIE)
CHALET DES ABRIS
Aug. 25, '94.
DEAR MR. ROGERS,--I find the Madam ever so much better in health and
strength. The air is superb and soothing and wholesome, and the Chalet
is remote from noise and people, and just the place to write in. I shall
begin work this afternoon.

Mrs. Clemens is in great spirits on, account of the benefit which she has
received from the electrical treatment in Paris and is bound to take it
up again and continue it all the winter, and of course I am perfectly
willing. She requires me to drop the lecture platform out of my mind and
go straight ahead with Joan until the book is finished. If I should have
to go home for even a week she means to go with me--won't consent to be
separated again--but she hopes I won't need to go.

I tell her all right, "I won't go unless you send, and then I must."

She keeps the accounts; and as she ciphers it we can't get crowded for
money for eight months yet. I didn't know that. But I don't know much
anyway.
Sincerely yours,
S. L. CLEMENS.


The reader may remember that Clemens had written the first half of
his Joan of Arc book at the Villa Viviani, in Florence, nearly two
years before. He had closed the manuscript then with the taking of
Orleans, and was by no means sure that he would continue the story
beyond that point. Now, however, he was determined to reach the
tale's tragic conclusion.


To H. H. Rogers, in New York:

ETRETAT,
Sunday, Sept. 9, '94.
DEAR MR. ROGERS, I drove the quill too hard, and I broke down--in my
head. It has now been three days since I laid up. When I wrote you a
week ago I had added 10,000 words or thereabout to Joan. Next day I
added 1,500 which was a proper enough day's work though not a full one;
but during Tuesday and Wednesday I stacked up an aggregate of 6,000
words--and that was a very large mistake. My head hasn't been worth a
cent since.

However, there's a compensation; for in those two days I reached and
passed--successfully--a point which I was solicitous about before I ever
began the book: viz., the battle of Patay. Because that would naturally
be the next to the last chapter of a work consisting of either two books
or one. In the one case one goes right along from that point (as I shall
do now); in the other he would add a wind-up chapter and make the book
consist of Joan's childhood and military career alone.

I shall resume work to-day; and hereafter I will not go at such an
intemperate' rate. My head is pretty cobwebby yet.

I am hoping that along about this time I shall hear that the machine is
beginning its test in the Herald office. I shall be very glad indeed to
know the result of it. I wish I could be there.
Sincerely yours
S. L. CLEMENS.


Rouen, where Joan met her martyrdom, was only a short distance away,
and they halted there en route to Paris, where they had arranged to
spend the winter. The health of Susy Clemens was not good, and they
lingered in Rouen while Clemens explored the old city and
incidentally did some writing of another sort. In a note to Mr.
Rogers he said: "To put in my odd time I am writing some articles
about Paul Bourget and his Outre-Mer chapters--laughing at them and
at some of our oracular owls who find them important. What the hell
makes them important, I should like to know!"

He was still at Rouen two weeks later and had received encouraging
news from Rogers concerning the type-setter, which had been placed
for trial in the office of the Chicago Herald. Clemens wrote: "I
can hardly keep from sending a hurrah by cable. I would certainly
do it if I wasn't superstitious." His restraint, though wise, was
wasted the end was near.


To H. H. Rogers, in New York:

169 RUE DE L'UNIVERSITE,
PARIS, Dec. 22; '94.
DEAR MR. ROGERS,--I seemed to be entirely expecting your letter, and also
prepared and resigned; but Lord, it shows how little we know ourselves
and how easily we can deceive ourselves. It hit me like a thunder-clap.
It knocked every rag of sense out of my head, and I went flying here and
there and yonder, not knowing what I was doing, and only one clearly
defined thought standing up visible and substantial out of the crazy
storm-drift that my dream of ten years was in desperate peril, and out of
the 60,000 or 90,000 projects for its rescue that came floating through
my skull, not one would hold still long enough for me to examine it and
size it up. Have you ever been like that? Not so much so, I reckon.

There was another clearly defined idea--I must be there and see it die.
That is, if it must die; and maybe if I were there we might hatch up some
next-to-impossible way to make it take up its bed and take a walk.

So, at the end of four hours I started, still whirling and walked over to
the rue Scribe--4 P. M.--and asked a question or two and was told I
should be running a big risk if I took the 9 P. M. train for London and
Southampton; "better come right along at 6.52 per Havre special and step
aboard the New York all easy and comfortable." Very! and I about two
miles from home, with no packing done.

Then it occurred to me that none of these salvation-notions that were
whirl-winding through my head could be examined or made available unless
at least a month's time could be secured. So I cabled you, and said to
myself that I would take the French steamer tomorrow (which will be
Sunday).

By bedtime Mrs. Clemens had reasoned me into a fairly rational and
contented state of mind; but of course it didn't last long. So I went on
thinking--mixing it with a smoke in the dressing room once an hour--until
dawn this morning. Result--a sane resolution; no matter what your answer
to my cable might be, I would hold still and not sail until I should get
an answer to this present letter which I am now writing, or a cable
answer from you saying "Come" or "Remain."