The Letters Of Mark Twain, Complete

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


When you want money, let Ma know, and she will send it. She and Pamela
are always fussing about change, so I sent them a hundred and twenty
quarters yesterday--fiddler's change enough to last till I get back, I
reckon.
SAM.


It is not so difficult to credit Madame Caprell with clairvoyant
powers when one has read the letters of Samuel Clemens up to this
point. If we may judge by those that have survived, her prophecy of
literary distinction for him was hardly warranted by anything she
could have known of his past performance. These letters of his
youth have a value to-day only because they were written by the man
who later was to become Mark Twain. The squibs and skits which he
sometimes contributed to the New Orleans papers were bright,
perhaps, and pleasing to his pilot associates, but they were without
literary value. He was twenty-five years old. More than one author
has achieved reputation at that age. Mark Twain was of slower
growth; at that age he had not even developed a definite literary
ambition: Whatever the basis of Madame Caprell's prophecy, we must
admit that she was a good guesser on several matters, "a right smart
little woman," as Clemens himself phrased it.

She overlooked one item, however: the proximity of the Civil War.
Perhaps it was too close at hand for second sight. A little more
than two months after the Caprell letter was written Fort Sumter was
fired upon. Mask Twain had made his last trip as a pilot up the
river to St. Louis--the nation was plunged into a four years'
conflict.

There are no letters of this immediate period. Young Clemens went
to Hannibal, and enlisting in a private company, composed mainly of
old schoolmates, went soldiering for two rainy, inglorious weeks,
by the end of which he had had enough of war, and furthermore had
discovered that he was more of a Union abolitionist than a
slave-holding secessionist, as he had at first supposed.
Convictions were likely to be rather infirm during those early days
of the war, and subject to change without notice. Especially was
this so in a border State.




III

LETTERS 1861-62. ON THE FRONTIER. MINING ADVENTURES.
JOURNALISTIC BEGINNINGS.

Clemens went from the battle-front to Keokuk, where Orion was
preparing to accept the appointment prophesied by Madame Caprell.
Orion was a stanch Unionist, and a member of Lincoln's Cabinet had
offered him the secretaryship of the new Territory of Nevada. Orion
had accepted, and only needed funds to carry him to his destination.
His pilot brother had the funds, and upon being appointed "private"
secretary, agreed to pay both passages on the overland stage, which
would bear them across the great plains from St. Jo to Carson City.
Mark Twain, in Roughing It, has described that glorious journey and
the frontier life that followed it. His letters form a supplement
of realism to a tale that is more or less fictitious, though
marvelously true in color and background. The first bears no date,
but it was written not long after their arrival, August 14, 1861.
It is not complete, but there is enough of it to give us a very fair
picture of Carson City, "a wooden town; its population two thousand
souls."


Part of a letter to Mrs. Jane Clemens, in St. Louis:

(Date not given, but Sept, or Oct., 1861.)
MY DEAR MOTHER,--I hope you will all come out here someday. But I shan't
consent to invite you, until we can receive you in style. But I guess we
shall be able to do that, one of these days. I intend that Pamela shall
live on Lake Bigler until she can knock a bull down with her fist--say,
about three months.

"Tell everything as it is--no better, and no worse."

Well, "Gold Hill" sells at $5,000 per foot, cash down; "Wild cat" isn't
worth ten cents. The country is fabulously rich in gold, silver, copper,
lead, coal, iron, quick silver, marble, granite, chalk, plaster of Paris,
(gypsum,) thieves, murderers, desperadoes, ladies, children, lawyers,
Christians, Indians, Chinamen, Spaniards, gamblers, sharpers, coyotes
(pronounced Ki-yo-ties,) poets, preachers, and jackass rabbits.
I overheard a gentleman say, the other day, that it was "the d---dest
country under the sun."--and that comprehensive conception I fully
subscribe to. It never rains here, and the dew never falls. No flowers
grow here, and no green thing gladdens the eye. The birds that fly over
the land carry their provisions with them. Only the crow and the raven
tarry with us. Our city lies in the midst of a desert of the purest
--most unadulterated, and compromising sand--in which infernal soil
nothing but that fag-end of vegetable creation, "sage-brush," ventures to
grow. If you will take a Lilliputian cedar tree for a model, and build a
dozen imitations of it with the stiffest article of telegraph wire--set
them one foot apart and then try to walk through them, you'll understand
(provided the floor is covered 12 inches deep with sand,) what it is to
wander through a sage-brush desert. When crushed, sage brush emits an
odor which isn't exactly magnolia and equally isn't exactly polecat but
is a sort of compromise between the two. It looks a good deal like
grease-wood, and is the ugliest plant that was ever conceived of. It is
gray in color. On the plains, sage-brush and grease-wood grow about
twice as large as the common geranium--and in my opinion they are a very
good substitute for that useless vegetable. Grease-wood is a perfect
--most perfect imitation in miniature of a live oak tree-barring the color
of it. As to the other fruits and flowers of the country, there ain't
any, except "Pulu" or "Tuler," or what ever they call it,--a species of
unpoetical willow that grows on the banks of the Carson--a RIVER, 20
yards wide, knee deep, and so villainously rapid and crooked, that it
looks like it had wandered into the country without intending it, and had
run about in a bewildered way and got lost, in its hurry to get out again
before some thirsty man came along and drank it up. I said we are
situated in a flat, sandy desert--true. And surrounded on all sides by
such prodigious mountains, that when you gaze at them awhile,--and begin
to conceive of their grandeur--and next to feel their vastness expanding
your soul--and ultimately find yourself growing and swelling and
spreading into a giant--I say when this point is reached, you look
disdainfully down upon the insignificant village of Carson, and in that
instant you are seized with a burning desire to stretch forth your hand,
put the city in your pocket, and walk off with it.

As to churches, I believe they have got a Catholic one here, but like
that one the New York fireman spoke of, I believe "they don't run her
now:" Now, although we are surrounded by sand, the greatest part of the
town is built upon what was once a very pretty grassy spot; and the
streams of pure water that used to poke about it in rural sloth and
solitude, now pass through on dusty streets and gladden the hearts of men
by reminding them that there is at least something here that hath its
prototype among the homes they left behind them. And up "King's Canon,"
(please pronounce canyon, after the manner of the natives,) there are
"ranches," or farms, where they say hay grows, and grass, and beets and
onions, and turnips, and other "truck" which is suitable for cows--yes,
and even Irish potatoes; also, cabbage, peas and beans.

The houses are mostly frame, unplastered, but "papered" inside with
flour-sacks sewed together, and the handsomer the "brand" upon the sacks
is, the neater the house looks. Occasionally, you stumble on a stone
house. On account of the dryness of the country, the shingles on the
houses warp till they look like short joints of stove pipe split
lengthwise.

(Remainder missing.)


In this letter is something of the "wild freedom of the West," which
later would contribute to his fame. The spirit of the frontier--of
Mark Twain--was beginning to stir him.

There had been no secretary work for him to do, and no provision for
payment. He found his profit in studying human nature and in
prospecting native resources. He was not interested in mining not
yet. With a boy named John Kinney he made an excursion to Lake
Bigler--now Tahoe--and located a timber claim, really of great
value. They were supposed to build a fence around it, but they were
too full of the enjoyment of camp-life to complete it. They put in
most of their time wandering through the stately forest or drifting
over the transparent lake in a boat left there by lumbermen. They
built themselves a brush house, but they did not sleep in it. In
'Roughing It' he writes, "It never occurred to us, for one thing;
and, besides, it was built to hold the ground, and that was enough.
We did not wish to strain it."

They were having a glorious time, when their camp-fire got away from
them and burned up their claim. His next letter, of which the
beginning is missing, describes the fire.


Fragment of a letter to Mrs. Jane Clemens and
Mrs. Moffett, in St. Louis:

....The level ranks of flame were relieved at intervals by the
standard-bearers, as we called the tall dead trees, wrapped in fire, and
waving their blazing banners a hundred feet in the air. Then we could
turn from this scene to the Lake, and see every branch, and leaf, and
cataract of flame upon its bank perfectly reflected as in a gleaming,
fiery mirror. The mighty roaring of the conflagration, together with our
solitary and somewhat unsafe position (for there was no one within six
miles of us,) rendered the scene very impressive. Occasionally, one of
us would remove his pipe from his mouth and say, "Superb! magnificent!
Beautiful! but-by the Lord God Almighty, if we attempt to sleep in this
little patch tonight, we'll never live till morning! for if we don't burn
up, we'll certainly suffocate." But he was persuaded to sit up until we
felt pretty safe as far as the fire was concerned, and then we turned in,
with many misgivings. When we got up in the morning, we found that the
fire had burned small pieces of drift wood within six feet of our boat,
and had made its way to within 4 or 5 steps of us on the South side. We
looked like lava men, covered as we were with ashes, and begrimed with
smoke. We were very black in the face, but we soon washed ourselves
white again.

John D. Kinney, a Cincinnati boy, and a first-rate fellow, too, who came
out with judge Turner, was my comrade. We staid at the Lake four days
--I had plenty of fun, for John constantly reminded me of Sam Bowen when
we were on our campaign in Missouri. But first and foremost, for Annie's,
Mollies, and Pamela's comfort, be it known that I have never been guilty
of profane language since I have been in this Territory, and Kinney
hardly ever swears.--But sometimes human nature gets the better of him.
On the second day we started to go by land to the lower camp, a distance
of three miles, over the mountains, each carrying an axe. I don't think
we got lost exactly, but we wandered four hours over the steepest,
rockiest and most dangerous piece of country in the world. I couldn't
keep from laughing at Kinney's distress, so I kept behind, so that he
could not see me. After he would get over a dangerous place, with
infinite labor and constant apprehension, he would stop, lean on his axe,
and look around, then behind, then ahead, and then drop his head and
ruminate awhile.--Then he would draw a long sigh, and say: "Well--could
any Billygoat have scaled that place without breaking his --- ------ neck?"
And I would reply, "No,--I don't think he could." "No--you don't think
he could--" (mimicking me,) "Why don't you curse the infernal place?
You know you want to.--I do, and will curse the --- ------ thieving
country as long as I live." Then we would toil on in silence for awhile.
Finally I told him--"Well, John, what if we don't find our way out of
this today--we'll know all about the country when we do get out." "Oh
stuff--I know enough--and too much about the d---d villainous locality
already." Finally, we reached the camp. But as we brought no provisions
with us, the first subject that presented itself to us was, how to get
back. John swore he wouldn't walk back, so we rolled a drift log apiece
into the Lake, and set about making paddles, intending to straddle the
logs and paddle ourselves back home sometime or other. But the Lake
objected--got stormy, and we had to give it up. So we set out for the
only house on this side of the Lake--three miles from there, down the
shore. We found the way without any trouble, reached there before
sundown, played three games of cribbage, borrowed a dug-out and pulled
back six miles to the upper camp. As we had eaten nothing since sunrise,
we did not waste time in cooking our supper or in eating it, either.
After supper we got out our pipes--built a rousing camp fire in the open
air-established a faro bank (an institution of this country,) on our huge
flat granite dining table, and bet white beans till one o'clock, when
John went to bed. We were up before the sun the next morning, went out
on the Lake and caught a fine trout for breakfast. But unfortunately, I
spoilt part of the breakfast. We had coffee and tea boiling on the fire,
in coffee-pots and fearing they might not be strong enough, I added more
ground coffee, and more tea, but--you know mistakes will happen.--I put
the tea in the coffee-pot, and the coffee in the teapot--and if you
imagine that they were not villainous mixtures, just try the effect once.

And so Bella is to be married on the 1st of Oct. Well, I send her and
her husband my very best wishes, and--I may not be here--but wherever I
am on that night, we'll have a rousing camp-fire and a jollification in
honor of the event.

In a day or two we shall probably go to the Lake and build another cabin
and fence, and get everything into satisfactory trim before our trip to
Esmeralda about the first of November.

What has become of Sam Bowen? I would give my last shirt to have him out
here. I will make no promises, but I believe if John would give him a
thousand dollars and send him out here he would not regret it. He might
possibly do very well here, but he could do little without capital.

Remember me to all my St. Louis and Keokuk friends, and tell Challie and
Hallie Renson that I heard a military band play "What are the Wild Waves
Saying?" the other night, and it reminded me very forcibly of them. It
brought Ella Creel and Belle across the Desert too in an instant, for
they sang the song in Orion's yard the first time I ever heard it. It
was like meeting an old friend. I tell you I could have swallowed that
whole band, trombone and all, if such a compliment would have been any
gratification to them.
Love to the young folks,
SAM.


The reference in the foregoing letter to Esmeralda has to do with mining
plans. He was beginning to be mildly interested, and, with his brother
Orion, had acquired "feet" in an Esmeralda camp, probably at a very small
price--so small as to hold out no exciting prospect of riches. In his
next letter he gives us the size of this claim, which he has visited.
His interest, however, still appears to be chiefly in his timber claim on
Lake Bigler (Tahoe), though we are never to hear of it again after this
letter.


To Mrs. Moffett, in St. Louis:

CARSON CITY, Oct. 25, 1861.
MY DEAR SISTER,--I have just finished reading your letter and Ma's of
Sept. 8th. How in the world could they have been so long coming? You
ask me if I have for gotten my promise to lay a claim for Mr. Moffett.
By no means. I have already laid a timber claim on the borders of a lake
(Bigler) which throws Como in the shade--and if we succeed in getting one
Mr. Jones, to move his saw-mill up there, Mr. Moffett can just consider
that claim better than bank stock. Jones says he will move his mill up
next spring. In that claim I took up about two miles in length by one in
width--and the names in it are as follows: "Sam. L Clemens, Wm. A.
Moffett, Thos. Nye" and three others. It is situated on "Sam Clemens
Bay"--so named by Capt. Nye--and it goes by that name among the
inhabitants of that region. I had better stop about "the Lake," though,
--for whenever I think of it I want to go there and die, the place is so
beautiful. I'll build a country seat there one of these days that will
make the Devil's mouth water if he ever visits the earth. Jim Lampton
will never know whether I laid a claim there for him or not until he
comes here himself. We have now got about 1,650 feet of mining ground
--and if it proves good, Mr. Moffett's name will go in--if not, I can get
"feet" for him in the Spring which will be good. You see, Pamela, the
trouble does not consist in getting mining ground--for that is plenty
enough--but the money to work it with after you get it is the mischief.
When I was in Esmeralda, a young fellow gave me fifty feet in the "Black
Warrior"--an unprospected claim. The other day he wrote me that he had
gone down eight feet on the ledge, and found it eight feet thick--and
pretty good rock, too. He said he could take out rock now if there were
a mill to crush it--but the mills are all engaged (there are only four of
them) so, if I were willing, he would suspend work until Spring. I wrote
him to let it alone at present--because, you see, in the Spring I can go
down myself and help him look after it. There will then be twenty mills
there. Orion and I have confidence enough in this country to think that
if the war will let us alone we can make Mr. Moffett rich without its
ever costing him a cent of money or particle of trouble. We shall lay
plenty of claims for him, but if they never pay him anything, they will
never cost him anything, Orion and I are not financiers. Therefore, you
must persuade Uncle Jim to come out here and help us in that line.
I have written to him twice to come. I wrote him today. In both letters
I told him not to let you or Ma know that we dealt in such romantic
nonsense as "brilliant prospects," because I always did hate for anyone
to know what my plans or hopes or prospects were--for, if I kept people
in ignorance in these matters, no one could be disappointed but myself,
if they were not realized. You know I never told you that I went on the
river under a promise to pay Bixby $500, until I had paid the money and
cleared my skirts of the possibility of having my judgment criticised.
I would not say anything about our prospects now, if we were nearer home.
But I suppose at this distance you are more anxious than you would be if
you saw us every month-and therefore it is hardly fair to keep you in the
dark. However, keep these matters to yourselves, and then if we fail,
we'll keep the laugh in the family.

What we want now is something that will commence paying immediately.
We have got a chance to get into a claim where they say a tunnel has been
run 150 feet, and the ledge struck. I got a horse yesterday, and went
out with the Attorney-General and the claim-owner--and we tried to go to
the claim by a new route, and got lost in the mountains--sunset overtook
us before we found the claim--my horse got too lame to carry me, and I
got down and drove him ahead of me till within four miles of town--then
we sent Rice on ahead. Bunker, (whose horse was in good condition,)
undertook, to lead mine, and I followed after him. Darkness shut him out
from my view in less than a minute, and within the next minute I lost the
road and got to wandering in the sage brush. I would find the road
occasionally and then lose it again in a minute or so. I got to Carson
about nine o'clock, at night, but not by the road I traveled when I left
it. The General says my horse did very well for awhile, but soon refused
to lead. Then he dismounted, and had a jolly time driving both horses
ahead of him and chasing them here and there through the sage brush (it
does my soul good when I think of it) until he got to town, when both
animals deserted him, and he cursed them handsomely and came home alone.
Of course the horses went to their stables.

Tell Sammy I will lay a claim for him, and he must come out and attend to
it. He must get rid of that propensity for tumbling down, though, for
when we get fairly started here, I don't think we shall have time to pick
up those who fall.....

That is Stoughter's house, I expect, that Cousin Jim has moved into.
This is just the country for Cousin Jim to live in. I don't believe it
would take him six months to make $100,000 here, if he had 3,000 dollars
to commence with. I suppose he can't leave his family though.

Tell Mrs. Benson I never intend to be a lawyer. I have been a slave
several times in my life, but I'll never be one again. I always intend
to be so situated (unless I marry,) that I can "pull up stakes" and clear
out whenever I feel like it.

We are very thankful to you, Pamela, for the papers you send. We have
received half a dozen or more, and, next to letters, they are the most
welcome visitors we have.
Write oftener, Pamela.
Yr. Brother
SAM.


The "Cousin Jim" mentioned in this letter is the original of the
character of Colonel Sellers. Whatever Mark Twain's later opinion of
Cousin Jim Lampton's financial genius may have been, he seems to have
respected it at this time.

More than three months pass until we have another letter, and in that
time the mining fever had become well seated. Mark Twain himself was
full of the Sellers optimism, and it was bound to overflow, fortify as he
would against it.

He met with little enough encouragement. With three companions, in
midwinter, he made a mining excursion to the much exploited Humboldt
region, returning empty-handed after a month or two of hard experience.
This is the trip picturesquely described in Chapters XXVII to XXXIII of
Roughing It.--[It is set down historically in Mark Twain 'A Biography.'
Harper & brothers.]--He, mentions the Humboldt in his next letter, but
does not confess his failure.


To Mrs. Jane Clemens and Mrs. Moffett, in St. Louis:

CARSON CITY, Feb. 8, 1862.
MY DEAR MOTHER AND SISTER,--By George Pamela, I begin to fear that I have
invoked a Spirit of some kind or other which I will find some difficulty
in laying. I wasn't much terrified by your growing inclinations, but
when you begin to call presentiments to your aid, I confess that I
"weaken." Mr. Moffett is right, as I said before--and I am not much
afraid of his going wrong. Men are easily dealt with--but when you get
the women started, you are in for it, you know. But I have decided on
two things, viz: Any of you, or all of you, may live in California, for
that is the Garden of Eden reproduced--but you shall never live in
Nevada; and secondly, none of you, save Mr. Moffett, shall ever cross the
Plains. If you were only going to Pike's Peak, a little matter of 700
miles from St. Jo, you might take the coach, and I wouldn't say a word.
But I consider it over 2,000 miles from St. Jo to Carson, and the first
6 or 800 miles is mere Fourth of July, compared to the balance of the
route. But Lord bless you, a man enjoys every foot of it. If you ever
come here or to California, it must be by sea. Mr. Moffett must come by
overland coach, though, by all means. He would consider it the jolliest
little trip he ever took in his life. Either June, July, or August are
the proper months to make the journey in. He could not suffer from heat,
and three or four heavy army blankets would make the cold nights
comfortable. If the coach were full of passengers, two good blankets
would probably be sufficient. If he comes, and brings plenty of money,
and fails to invest it to his entire satisfaction; I will prophesy no
more.

But I will tell you a few things which you wouldn't have found out if I
hadn't got myself into this scrape. I expect to return to St. Louis in
July--per steamer. I don't say that I will return then, or that I shall
be able to do it--but I expect to--you bet. I came down here from
Humboldt, in order to look after our Esmeralda interests, and my
sore-backed horse and the bad roads have prevented me from making the
journey. Yesterday one of my old Esmeralda friends, Bob Howland, arrived
here, and I have had a talk with him. He owns with me in the "Horatio
and Derby" ledge. He says our tunnel is in 52 feet, and a small stream
of water has been struck, which bids fair to become a "big thing" by the
time the ledge is reached--sufficient to supply a mill. Now, if you knew
anything of the value of water, here; you would perceive, at a glance
that if the water should amount to 50 or 100 inches, we wouldn't care
whether school kept or not. If the ledge should prove to be worthless,
we'd sell the water for money enough to give us quite a lift. But you
see, the ledge will not prove to be worthless. We have located, near by,
a fine site for a mill; and when we strike the ledge, you know, we'll
have a mill-site, water power, and pay-rock, all handy. Then we shan't
care whether we have capital or not. Mill-folks will build us a mill,
and wait for their pay. If nothing goes wrong, we'll strike the ledge in
June--and if we do, I'll be home in July, you know.