Of All Things Part 18

With a few coins that my father had slipped into my hand as I left home, I engaged a tiny suite at the St. Regis and there set about my writing.

The first 10,000 ma.n.u.scripts which I sent out, I now have. (I am at present working them over into a serial for the _Sat.u.r.day Evening Post_ weekly, from which I expect to make $25,000). But that is beside the point. For the purposes of the present narrative, I was a failure. The manager of the hotel was pressing me for my rent, which was already several hours overdue. I had not tipped the chamber-maid since breakfast. I sat looking out at my window, staring at the squalid wall of the Hotel Ritz. I had met New York face to face--and I had lost.

No, not lost! There was still one chance left I sat down and, with feverish haste, wrote out a glowing account of my failure. I spared no detail of my degradation, even to taking fruit from the hotel table to my room.

Then I began to fabricate. I told how I had overcome all these handicaps and had made a success of myself. I lied. I said that I was now drawing down $200,000 a year, but that I had never forgotten my old friends. It was a good yarn, but it took me a long while to make it up. And when, at last, it was ready, I sent it to the _American Magazine_.

This is it!

How Insane Are You?

Following is a test used in all State Hospitals to determine the fitness of the inmates for occasional sh.o.r.e leave. Try it on yourself and see where you get off.

TEST NO. 1

If you really are the reincarnation of Learning, write something here ... but if you are being hounded by a lot of relatives whom you dislike, ring and walk in. Then, granting all this, how does it come about that you, a member of the Interstate Commerce Commission, wear no collar?... Ha, ha, we caught you there! But otherwise, write any letter beginning with _w_ in this s.p.a.ce. Yes, there is the s.p.a.ce,--what's the matter with you? Go back and look again.... You win. Now, in spite of what the neighbors say, give three reasons for not giving three reasons why this proves that you are sane, or, as the case may be.

HARPER'S MAGAZINE

Through the Dobrudja with Gun and Camera

There was a heavy mist falling as we left Ilanlac, rendering the _cozbars_ (native _doblacs_) doubly indistinguishable. This was unfortunate, as we had planned on taking many photographs, some of which are reproduced here.

Our party consisted of seven members of the Society: Molwinch, young Houghbotham, Capt. Ramp, and myself, together with fourteen native _barbudos_ (_luksni_ who are under the draft age), a boat's crew, two helpers, and some potted tongue. Lieut. Furbearing, the Society's press-agent, had sailed earlier in the week, and was to join us at Curtea de Argesh.

Before us, as we progressed, lay the Tecuci, s.h.i.+mmering in the reflected light of the _sun_ (sun). They were named by their discoverer, Joao Galatz, after his uncle, whose name was Wurgle, or, as he was known among the natives, "Wurgle." From that time (1808) until 1898, no automobile was ever seen on one of the Tecuci, although many of the inhabitants subsisted entirely on what we call "cottage-cheese."

The weevils of this district (_Curculionidae_) remarkable for their lack of poise. We saw several of them, just at sundown, when, according to an old native legend, the weevil comes out to defy the G.o.d of _Acor_, his ancient enemy, and never, not even in Castanheira, have I seen weevils more embarra.s.sed than those upon whom we came suddenly at a bend in the Selch River.

Early morning found us filing up the Buzeau Valley, with the gun-bearers and bus-boys in single-file behind us, and a picturesque lot they were, too, with their lisle socks and queer patch-pockets. In taking a picture of them, I walked backward into the Buzeau River, which delayed the party, as I had, in my bag, the key with which the potted tongue cans were to be opened.

We were fortunate enough to catch several male puffins, which were so ingenuous as to eat the carpet-tacks we offered them. The puffin (_Thala.s.sidroma buleverii_), is easily distinguishable from the more effete robin of America because the two birds are similar in no essential points. This makes it convenient for the naturalist, who might otherwise get them mixed. Puffins are hunted princ.i.p.ally for their companionable qualities, a domesticated puffin being held the equal--if not quite--of the average Dobrudjan housewife in many respects, such as, for instance, self-respect.

It was late in the afternoon of the third day, when we finally reached Dimbovitza, and the cool _llemla_ was indeed refres.h.i.+ng. It had been, we one and all agreed, a most interesting trip, and we vowed that we should not forget our Three Days in the Dobrudja.

Dead Leaves

"Ain't you got them dishes done up yet, Irma?"

A petulant voice from what, in Central New England, is called the "sittin' room," penetrated the cool silence of the farm-house kitchen.

Irma Hathaway pa.s.sed her hand heavily before her eyes.

"Yes, Ma," she replied wearily, as she threw a cup at the steel engraving of "The Return of the Mayflower" which hung on the kitchen wall. She wondered when she would die.

A cold wind blew along the corridor which connected the kitchen with the wood-shed. Then, as if disgruntled, it blew back again, like a man returning to his room after a fresh handkerchief. Irma shuddered. It was all so inexplicably depressing.

For eighteen years the sun had never been able to s.h.i.+ne in Bemis Corners. G.o.d knows it had tried. But there had always been something imponderable, something monstrously bleak, which had thrown itself, like a great cloak, between the warm light of that body and the grim reality of Bemis Corners.

"If Eben had only known," thought Irma, and buried her face in the soapy water.

Some one entered the room from the wood-shed, stamping the snow from his boots. She knew, without looking up, that it was Ira.

"Why hev you come?" she said softly, lifting her moist eyes to him. It was not Ira. It was the hired man. She sobbed pitifully and leaped upon the roller-towel which hung on the door, pulling it round and round like a captive squirrel in a revolving cage.

"It ain't no use," she moaned.

And, through the cadavers of the apple-trees in the orchard behind the house, there rattled a wind from the sea, the sea to which men go down in s.h.i.+ps never to return, telling of sorrow and all that sort of thing.

"Fate," some people call it.

To Irma Hathaway it was all the same.

June, July, August

_Tulips, crocuses and chard,_ _And the wax bean_ _In the back yard._ _And the open road to the land of dreams,_ _With the heavy swirl_ _Of the singing streams._ _Oh! boy!_

Unpublished Letters of Mark Twain

_With a foreword by Albert Bigelow Paine_[1]

FOREWORD

This letter from Mark Twain to Mr. Horace J. Borrow of Hartford has recently been called to my attention by a niece of Mr. Borrow's who now lives in Glas...o...b..ry. I have no reason to believe that the lady is a charlatan, in fact, I have often heard Mark Twain speak of Mr.

Borrow in the highest terms.

[Footnote 1: The complete works of Mark Twain, with complete forewords by Mr. Paine are, oddly enough, published by Harper and Bros. who, oddly enough, also publish this magazine. We celebrate this coincidence by offering the complete set to our readers on easy and friendly terms.]

_Mr. Horace J. Borrow_ _Hartford, Connecticut_

Dear Mr. Borrow: Enclosed find check for ten dollars ($10) in payment of my annual dues for the year 1891-2.

Yours truly, (Signed) S.L. CLEMENS.

Highways and By-Ways in Old Fall River

The chance visitor to Fall River may be said, like the old fisherman in "Bartholomew Fair," to have "seen half the world, without tasting its savor." Wandering down the Main Street, with its clanging trolley-cars and noisy drays, one wonders (as, indeed, one may well wonder), if all this is a manifestation so much of Fall River as it is of that for which Fall River stands.