The Portable Mark Twain Read online

  ‘Bolivia extemporaizes mackerel; borax esteems polygamy; sausages wither in the east. Creation perdu, is done; for woes inherent one can damn. Buttons, buttons, corks, geology underrates but we shall allay. My beer’s out. Yrxwly,

  HEVACE EVEELOJ.’

  “I was evidently overworked. My comprehension was impaired. Therefore I gave two days to recreation, and then returned to my task greatly refreshed. The letter now took this form:

  ‘Poultices do sometimes choke swine; tulips reduco posterity; causes leather to resist. Our notions empower wisdom, her let’s afford while we can. Butter but any cakes, fill any undertaker, we’ll wean him from his filly. We feel hot. Yrxwly,

  HEVACE EVEELOJ.’

  “I was still not satisfied. These generalities did not meet the question. They were crisp, and vigorous, and delivered with a confidence that almost compelled conviction; but at such a time as this, with a human life at stake, they seemed inappropriate, worldly, and in bad taste. At any other time I would have been not only glad, but proud, to receive from a man like Mr. Greeley a letter of this kind, and would have studied it earnestly and tried to improve myself all I could; but now, with that poor boy in his far home languishing for relief, I had no heart for learning.

  “Three days passed by, and I read the note again. Again its tenor had changed. It now appeared to say:

  ‘Potations do sometimes wake wines; turnips restrain passion; causes necessary to state. Infest the poor widow; her lord’s effects will be void. But dirt, bathing, etc., etc., followed unfairly, will worm him from his folly—to swear not. Yrxwly,

  HEVACE EVEELOJ.’

  “This was more like it. But I was unable to proceed. I was too much worn. The word ‘turnips’ brought temporary joy and encouragement, but my strength was so much impaired, and the delay might be so perilous for the boy, that I relinquished the idea of pursuing the translation further, and resolved to do what I ought to have done at first. I sat down and wrote Mr. Greeley as follows:

  “DEAR SIR: I fear I do not entirely comprehend your kind note. It cannot be possible, Sir, that ‘turnips restrain passion’—at least the study or contemplation of turnips cannot—for it is this very employment that has scorched our poor friend’s mind and sapped his bodily strength.—But if they do restrain it, will you bear with us a little further and explain how they should be prepared? I observe that you say ‘causes necessary to state,’ but you have omitted to state them.

  “Under a misapprehension, you seem to attribute to me interested motives in this matter—to call it by no harsher term. But I assure you, dear sir, that if I seem to be ‘infesting the widow,’ it is all seeming and void of reality. It is from no seeking of mine that I am in this position. She asked me, herself, to write you. I never have infested her—indeed I scarcely know her. I do not infest anybody. I try to go along, in my humble way, doing as near right as I can, never harming anybody, and never throwing out insinuations. As for ‘her lord and his effects,’ they are of no interest to me. I trust I have effects enough of my own—shall endeavor to get along with them, at any rate, and not go mousing around to get hold of somebody’s that are ‘void.’ But do you not see?—this woman is a widow—she has no ‘lord.’ He is dead—or pretended to be, when they buried him. Therefore, no amount of ‘dirt, bathing,’ etc., etc., howsoever ‘unfairly followed’ will be likely to ‘worm him from his folly’—if being dead and a ghost is ‘folly.’ Your closing remark is as unkind as it was uncalled for; and if report says true you might have applied it to yourself, sir, with more point and less impropriety.

  Very Truly Yours, SIMON ERICKSON.

  “In the course of a few days, Mr. Greeley did what would have saved a world of trouble, and much mental and bodily suffering and misunderstanding, if he had done it sooner. To-wit, he sent an intelligible rescript or translation of his original note, made in a plain hand by his clerk. Then the mystery cleared, and I saw that his heart had been right, all the time. I will recite the note in its clarified form:

  [Translation]

  ‘Potatoes do sometimes make vines; turnips remain passive: cause unnecessary to state. Inform the poor widow her lad’s efforts will be vain. But diet, bathing, etc. etc., followed uniformly, will wean him from his folly—so fear not.

  Yours, HORACE GREELEY.’

  “But alas, it was too late, gentlemen—too late. The criminal delay had done its work—young Beazely was no more. His spirit had taken its flight to a land where all anxieties shall be charmed away, all desires gratified, all ambitions realized. Poor lad, they laid him to his rest with a turnip in each hand.”

  So ended Erickson, and lapsed again into nodding, mumbling, and abstraction. The company broke up, and left him so. . . . But they did not say what drove him crazy. In the momentary confusion, I forgot to ask.

  “An Encounter with an Interviewer” (1874)

  The nervous, dapper, “peart” young man took the chair I offered him, and said he was connected with the Daily Thunder-storm, and added,—

  “Hoping it’s no harm, I’ve come to interview you.”

  “Come to what?”

  “Interview you.”

  “Ah! I see. Yes,—yes. Um! Yes,—yes.”

  I was not feeling bright that morning. Indeed, my powers seemed a bit under a cloud. However, I went to the bookcase, and when I had been looking six or seven minutes, I found I was obliged to refer to the young man. I said,—

  “How do you spell it?”

  “Spell what?”

  “Interview.”

  “O my goodness! What do you want to spell it for?”

  “I don’t want to spell it; I want to see what it means.”

  “Well, this is astonishing, I must say. I can tell you what it means, if you—if you—”

  “O, all right! That will answer, and much obliged to you, too.”

  “I n, in, t e r, ter, inter—”

  “Then you spell it with an I?”

  “Why, certainly!”

  “Oh, that is what took me so long.”

  “Why, my dear sir, what did you propose to spell it with?”

  “Well, I—I—I hardly know. I had the Unabridged, and I was ciphering around in the back end, hoping I might tree her among the pictures. But it’s a very old edition.”

  “Why, my friend, they wouldn’t have a picture of it in even the latest e—My dear sir, I beg your pardon, I mean no harm in the world, but you do not look as—as—intelligent as I had expected you would. No harm,—I mean no harm at all.”

  “O, don’t mention it! It has often been said, and by people who would not flatter and who could have no inducement to flatter, that I am quite remarkable in that way. Yes,—yes; they always speak of it with rapture.”

  “I can easily imagine it. But how about this interview. You know it is the custom, now, to interview any man who has become notorious.”

  “Indeed! I had not heard of it before. It must be very interesting. What do you do it with?”

  “Ah, well,—well,—well,—this is disheartening. It ought to be done with a club in some cases; but customarily it consists in the interviewer asking questions and the interviewed answering them. It is all the rage now. Will you let me ask you certain questions calculated to bring out the salient points of your public and private history?”

  “O, with pleasure,—with pleasure. I have a very bad memory, but I hope you will not mind that. That is to say, it is an irregular memory,—singularly irregular. Sometimes it goes in a gallop, and then again it will be as much as a fortnight passing a given point. This is a great grief to me.”

  “O, it is no matter, so you will try to do the best you can.”

  “I will. I will put my whole mind on it.”

  “Thanks. Are you ready to begin?”

  “Ready.”

  Q. How old are you?

  A. Nineteen, in June.

  Q. Indeed! I would have taken you to be thirty-five or six. Where were you born?

  A. In Missouri.
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  Q. When did you begin to write?

  A. In 1836.

  Q. Why, how could that be, if you are only nineteen now?

  A. I don’t know. It does seem curious, somehow.

  Q. It does, indeed. Who do you consider the most remarkable man you ever met?

  A. Aaron Burr.

  Q. But you never could have met Aaron Burr, if you are only nineteen years—

  A. Now, if you know more about me than I do, what do you ask me for?

  Q. Well, it was only a suggestion; nothing more. How did you happen to meet Burr?

  A. Well, I happened to be at his funeral one day, and he asked me to make less noise, and—

  Q. But, good heavens! If you were at his funeral, he must have been dead; and if he was dead, how could he care whether you made a noise or not?

  A. I don’t know. He was always a particular kind of a man that way.

  Q. Still, I don’t understand it at all. You say he spoke to you and that he was dead.

  A. I didn’t say he was dead.

  Q. But wasn’t he dead?

  A. Well, some said he was, some said he wasn’t.

  Q. What did you think?

  A. O, it was none of my business! It wasn’t any of my funeral.

  Q. Did you—However, we can never get this matter straight. Let me ask about something else. What was the date of your birth?

  A. Monday, October 31, 1693.

  Q. What! Impossible! That would make you a hundred and eighty years old. How do you account for that?

  A. I don’t account for it at all.

  Q. But you said at first you were only nineteen, and now you make yourself out to be one hundred and eighty. It is an awful discrepancy.

  A. Why, have you noticed that? (Shaking hands.) Many a time it has seemed to me like a discrepancy, but somehow I couldn’t make up my mind. How quick you notice a thing!

  Q. Thank you for the compliment, as far as it goes. Had you, or have you, any brothers or sisters?

  A. Eh! I—I—I think so,—yes,—but I don’t remember.

  Q. Well, that is the most extraordinary statement I ever heard!

  A. Why, what makes you think that?

  Q. How could I think otherwise? Why, look here! who is this a picture of on the wall? Isn’t that a brother of yours?

  A. Oh! yes, yes, yes! Now you remind me of it, that was a brother of mine. That’s William,—Bill we called him. Poor old Bill!

  Q. Why? Is he dead, then?

  A. Ah, well, I suppose so. We never could tell. There was a great mystery about it.

  Q. That is sad, very sad. He disappeared, then?

  A. Well, yes, in a sort of general way. We buried him.

  Q. Buried him! Buried him without knowing whether he was dead or not?

  A. O no! Not that. He was dead enough.

  Q. Well, I confess that I can’t understand this. If you buried him and you know he was dead—

  A. No! no! we only thought he was.

  Q. O, I see! He came to life again?

  A. I bet he didn’t.

  Q. Well, I never heard anything like this. Somebody was dead. Somebody was buried. Now, where was the mystery?

  A. Ah, that’s just it! That’s it exactly. You see we were twins,—defunct and I,—and we got mixed in the bath-tub when we were only two weeks old, and one of us was drowned. But we didn’t know which. Some think it was Bill, some think it was me.

  Q. Well, that is remarkable. What do you think?

  A. Goodness knows! I would give whole worlds to know. This solemn, this awful mystery has cast a gloom over my whole life. But I will tell you a secret now, which I never have revealed to any creature before. One of us had a peculiar mark, a large mole on the back of his left hand,—that was me. That child was the one that was drowned.

  Q. Very well, then, I don’t see that there is any mystery about it, after all.

  A. You don’t? Well, I do. Anyway I don’t see how they could ever have been such a blundering lot as to go and bury the wrong child. But, ’sh!—don’t mention it where the family can hear of it. Heaven knows they have heart-breaking troubles enough without adding this.

  Q. Well, I believe I have got material enough for the present, and I am very much obliged to you for the pains you have taken. But I was a good deal interested in that account of Aaron Burr’s funeral. Would you mind telling me what particular circumstance it was that made you think Burr was such a remarkable man?

  A. O, it was a mere trifle! Not one man in fifty would have noticed it at all. When the sermon was over, and the procession all ready to start for the cemetery, and the body all arranged nice in the hearse, he said he wanted to take a last look at the scenery, and so he got up and rode with the driver.

  Then the young man reverently withdrew. He was very pleasant company, and I was sorry to see him go.

  “A True Story, Repeated Word for Word as I Heard It” (1874)

  It was summer time, and twilight. We were sitting on the porch of the farm-house, on the summit of the hill, and “Aunt Rachel” was sitting respectfully below our level, on the steps,—for she was our servant, and colored. She was of mighty frame and stature; she was sixty years old, but her eye was undimmed and her strength unabated. She was a cheerful, hearty soul, and it was no more trouble for her to laugh than it is for a bird to sing. She was under fire, now, as usual when the day was done. That is to say, she was being chaffed without mercy, and was enjoying it. She would let off peal after peal of laughter, and then sit with her face in her hands and shake with throes of enjoyment which she could no longer get breath enough to express. At such a moment as this a thought occurred to me, and I said:—

  “Aunt Rachel, how is it that you’ve lived sixty years and never had any trouble?”

  She stopped quaking. She paused, and there was a moment of silence. She turned her face over her shoulder toward me, and said, without even a smile in her voice:—

  “Misto C—, is you in ’arnest?”

  It surprised me a good deal; and it sobered my manner and my speech, too. I said:—

  “Why, I thought—that is, I meant—why, you can’t have had any trouble. I’ve never heard you sigh, and never seen your eye when there wasn’t a laugh in it.”

  She faced fairly around, now, and was full of earnestness.

  “Has I had any trouble? Misto C—, I’s gwyne to tell you, den I leave it to you. I was bawn down ’mongst de slaves; I knows all ’bout slavery, ’case I ben one of ’em my own se’f. Well, sah, my ole man—dat’s my husban’—he was lovin’ an’ kind to me, jist as kind as you is to yo’ own wife. An’ we had chil’en—seven chil’en—an’ we loved dem chil’en jist de same as you loves you’ chil’en. Dey was black, but de Lord can’t make no chil’en so black but what dey mother loves ’em an’ wouldn’t give ’em up, no, not for anything dat’s in dis whole world.

  “Well, sah, I was raised in ole Fo’ginny, but my mother she was raised in Maryland; an’ my souls! she was turrible when she’d git started! My lan’! but she’d make de fur fly! When she’d git into dem tantrums, she always had one word dat she said. She’d straighten herse’f up an’ put her fists in her hips an’ say, ‘I want you to understan’ dat I wa’n’t bawn in de mash to be fool’ by trash! I’s one o’ de ole Blue Hen’s Chickens, I is!’ ’Ca’se, you see, dat’s what folks dat’s bawn in Maryland calls deyselves, an’ dey’s proud of it. Well, dat was her word. I don’t ever forgit it, beca’se she said it so much, an’ beca’se she said it one day when my little Henry tore his wris’ awful, an’ most busted his head, right up at de top of his forehead, an’ de niggers didn’t fly aroun’ fas’ enough to ’tend to him. An’ when dey talk’ back at her, she up an’ says, ‘Look-a-heah!’ she says, ‘I want you niggers to understan’ dat I wa’n’t bawn in de mash to be fool’ by trash! I’s one o’ de ole Blue Hen’s Chickens, I is!’ an’ den she clar’ dat kitchen an’ bandage’ up de chile herse’f. So I says dat word, too, when I’s riled.

  “Well, by
meby my ole mistis say she’s broke, an’ she got to sell all de niggers on de place. An’ when I heah dat dey gwyne to sell us all off at oction in Richmon’, oh de good gracious! I know what dat mean!”

  Aunt Rachel had gradually risen, while she warmed to her subject, and now she towered above us, black against the stars.

  “Dey put chains on us an’ put us on a stan’ as high as dis po’ch,—twenty foot high,—an’ all de people stood aroun’, crowds an’ crowds. An’ dey ’d come up dah an’ look at us all roun’, an’ squeeze our arm, an’ make us git up an’ walk, an’ den say, ‘Dis one too ole,’ or ‘Dis one lame,’ or ‘Dis one don’t ’mount to much.’ An’ dey sole my ole man, an’ took him away, an’ dey begin to sell my chil’en an’ take dem away, an’ I begin to cry; an’ de man say, ‘Shet up yo’ dam blubberin’,’ an’ hit me on de mouf wid his han’. An’ when de las’ one was gone but my little Henry, I grab’ him clost up to my breas’ so, an’ I ris up an’ says, ‘You shan’t take him away,’ I says; ‘I’ll kill de man dat tetches him!’ I says. But my little Henry whisper an’ say, ‘I gwyne to run away, an’ den I work an’ buy yo’ freedom.’ Oh, bless de chile, he always so good! But dey got him—dey got him, de men did; but I took and tear de clo’es mos’ off of ’em, an’ beat ’em over de head wid my chain; an’ dey give it to me, too, but I didn’t mine dat.