mark twain - interview

8/12/2019 Mark Twain - Interview

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and Dean of the corps. Most of the old fellows are dead -- Whitely of the Herald, Crouse of theTimes, Adams of the World, Henry of the Tribune, Cobright of the Associated Press. Jim Youngis Executive Clerk of the Senate, John Russell Young is journalist at large, Ed. Stedman hasgrown to be the banker poet, and Henry Villard -- well, you know all about him and hisfortunes."

"Yes; some of these men I never knew in Washington; a few of them were here before mytime. In fact, I was rather new and shy, and I did not mingle in the festivities of NewspaperRow. Probably most of the men you mention were perfectly unconscious of my existence. TheMorning Call and Virginia City Enterprise did not make much of a commotion in the UnitedStates."

"I roomed in a house which also sheltered George Alfred Townsend, Ramsdell, George Adams,and Riley of the San Francisco Alta. I represented the Virginia (Nevada) Enterprise. Also, I wasprivate secretary to Senator Stewart, but a capabler man did the work. A little later, thatwinter, William Swinton and I housed together. Swinton invented the idea -- at least it wasnew to me -- of manifolding correspondence, I mean of sending duplicates of a letter tovarious widely separated newspapers. We projected an extensive business; but for somereason or other we took it out in dreaming -- never really tried it." Here Mark walked into thegallery and looked down on the vacant Senatorial seats.

"I was here last," he went on, "in 1868. I had been on that lark to the Mediterranean and hadwritten a few letters to the San Francisco Alta that had been copied past all calculation and tomy utter astonishment, and a publisher wanted a book. I came back here to write it."

"Why, I was offered an office in that ancient time, by the California Senators, -- minister toChina. Think of that! It wasn't a time when they hunted around for competent people. No, onlyone qualification was required: You must please Andy Johnson and the Senate. Nearly anybody

could please one of them, but to please both -- well, it took an angel to do that. However, Ideclined to toy for the prize. I hadn't anything against the Chinese, and besides, we couldn'tspare any angels then."

"A pretty good place to write," I remarked as we took seats.

MARK TWAIN WRITING UNDER DIFFICULTIES


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"Some things," he said, "but an awfully bad place for a newspaper man to write a book; or, atany rate, for such a newspaper man as I was to write such a book as the publisher demanded. Itried it hard, but my chum was a story-teller, and both he and the stove smoked incessantly.And as we were located handy for the boys to run in, the room was always full of the boys,who leaned back in my chairs, put their feet complacently on my manuscript and smoked till Icould not breathe."

"Is that the way you wrote Innocents Abroad?" I asked.

"No; that is the way I didn't write it. My publisher prodded me for copy which I couldn'tproduce, till at last I arose and kicked Washington behind me and ran off to San Francisco.There I got elbow-room and quiet."

"It was apparently a wise move," I concurred, "but you could write here now, and this isexactly the place for a man like you. More intellectual society is attainable here than in anyother city of the world. The only big mistake of your successful life, Clemens" -- for only hisintimate friends address him as "Mark" -- "is not coming to Washington to live. Why, all overthe United States, people of leisure and culture are" --

"Yes, I know, I know," broke in Clemens, "but don't tantalize me. Do you take a fiendishenjoyment in making me suffer? I know perfectly well what I am about, and I appreciate what Iam losing. Washington is no doubt the boss town in the country for a man to live who wants toget all the pleasure he can in a given number of months. But I wasn't built that way. I don'twant the earth at one gulp. All of us are always losing some pleasure that we might have if wecould be everywhere at once.

"I lose Washington, for instance, for the privilege of saving my life. My doctor told me that if I

wanted my three score and ten, I must go to bed early, keep out of social excitements andbehave myself. You can't do that in Washington. Nobody does. Look at John Hay. Just fadingaway, I have no doubt, amid these scenes of mad revelry. My wife, you know, is practically aninvalid, too, so that neither of us could keep up with the procession. No, the best place for us isquiet and beautiful Hartford, though there is a good deal of the society of Washington that Ishould delight in."

"I supposed you have been pirated a good deal," I said to Mr. Clemens. "I do not mean by

illegal publication of your works, but by private individuals claiming to write your writings?"


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"Oh, yes," he said, "considerably -- some scores of cases, I suppose. One ambitious individualin the West still claims to have written the 'Jumping Frog of Calaveras County,' and another issure that he produced that classic work known as 'Jim Wolfe and the Cats.' I suppose eitherwould face me down with it; and their conduct has led me to conjecture that a man maypossibly claim a piece of property so long and persistently that he at last comes honestly tobelieve it is his own. You know that poor fellow in New Jersey, so weak-minded as to declarethat he wrote 'Beautiful Snow,' and going to his coffin with tearful protests? And you knowabout Col. Joyce and Ella Wheeler, and 'laugh and the world laughs with you?'

"But I haven't been bothered that way so much as I have by personators. In a good manyplaces men have appeared, represented that they were Mark Twain and have corroboratedthe claim by borrowing money and immediately disappearing. Such personators do not alwaysborrow money. Sometimes they seem to be actuated by a sort of idiotic vanity.

"Why, a fellow stopped at a hotel in an English city, registered as Mark Twain, struck up anacquaintance with the landlord and guests, recited for them and was about to accept a publicdinner of welcome to city, when some mere accident exposed him. Yet I myself had stoppedfor weeks at that same inn and was well known to the landlord and citizens. His effrontery wasamazing."

"Did he resemble you?"

"I do not know. I hope and believe that he did not. Parties whom I have since been inclined toregard as my enemies had the indecency to say that he did."

"The same thing happened in Boston and several other cities. It was not pleasant to have billscoming in for money lent to me in Albany, Charleston, Mexico. Honolulu, and other places, and

my calm explanation that I was not there bringing sarcastic letters in reply with 'Oh, of coursenot! I didn't see you with my own eyes did I?' etc., and I resolved that I would follow up thenext swindler I heard of. I had not long to wait. A dispatch came from Des Moines, Iowa:"

" 'Is Mark Twain at home?' "

" 'Yes, I am here and have not been away.' I answered."


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" 'Man personated you -- got $250 from audience -- shall I catch him?' came back, bearing thesignature of a lawyer.

" 'Yes,' I telegraphed in reply, 'have sent you check for expenses.'

"He was a good while catching him -- some weeks -- perhaps months, and then he made me anelaborate report giving the route of his labyrinthine and serpentine chase of the swindler, themoney he had expended, and the information that he did not entirely and completely catchhim, though he 'got near him several times.' I was out some hundreds of dollars.

"I was disgusted; and when I got another dispatch -- from New Orleans, I think it was --

" 'Man swindled audience with pretended lecture here last night, claiming to be you. Whatshall we do? I telegraphed back unanimously, 'Let him go! Let him go!"

"I'd give $100 thought to see one of these doppel-gangers who personate me before anaudience, just to see what they look like."

Mark Twain goes to Washington to work for the passage of an international copyright law inconjunction with Edward Eggleston, Gilder and other authors. Senator Reagan, of Texas, afriend of Mark's but an opponent of his pet measure, greeted him cordially last Winter with"How are you, Mark? How are you? Right glad to see you! Glad to see you! Hope to see youhere every session as long as you live!"

"MARK HIS GRACEFUL POSE" One of Mark Twain's favorite amusements in Washington isturning himself into an amateur guide and explaining to his friends the various objects ofinterest in the Capitol. He is particularly facetious over the pictures in the rotunda and thestone people in "Statuary Hall." Arriving opposite the marble statue of Fulton, seated, andintently examining the model of a steamboat in his hands, he indulges in a wide-sweepinggesture and exclaims: "This, ladies and gentlemen, is Pennsylvania's favorite son, RobertFulton. Observe his easy and unconventional attitude. Notice his serene and contentedexpression, caught by the artist at the moment when he made up his mind to steal John Fitch'ssteamboat."


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The humorist dresses a good deal more carefully than formerly, this is made necessary by hisincreasing amplitude, by his vast shock of grey hair, by his boisterous and ungovernablemoustache, and by his turbulent eyebrows that cover his grey eyes like a dissolute thatch. Andwhen he talks he talks slowly and extracts each of his vowels with a corkscrew twist that wouldmake even the announcement of a funeral sound like a joke.

W. A. CROFFUT.

mark twain - interview

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