think very hard of it - if not harder. That's the way to talk it. I ain't agoin to commit myself. I know when to put on the brakes. I ain't going to say all I 5 think, like Mr. Etheridge, or Mr. Addering so-called. Nary time. No, sir. But I'll jest tell you, Artemus, and you may tell it to your show: If we ain't allowed to express our sentiments, we can take it 10 out in hatin; and hatin runs heavy in my family, shure. I hated a man so bad once that all the hair cum off my head, and the man drownd himself in a hog-wallow that night. I could do it agin, but you see, 15 I'm tryin to harmonize, to acquiese, to becum calm and sereen.

They won't work for us, and they won't work for themselves, and they'll perish to death this winter as shure as the devil is a hog, so-called. They are now bask5 ing in the summer's sun, livin on rosting ears and freedom, with nary idee that the winter will come agin, or that castor-oil and salts costs money. Sum of 'em, a hundred years old, are whining around

my friend, somebody's badly fooled about this bizness. Somebody has drawd the elefant in the lottery, and don't know what to do with him. He's jest throwing his snout loose, and by and by he 'll hurt somebody. These niggers will have to go back to the plantations and work. I ain't agoin to support nary one of 'em, and when you hear any one say so you tell him it's a lie,' so-called. I golly, I ain't got nuthin to support myself on. We fought ourselves out of everything excepting children and land, and I suppose the land are to be turned over to the niggers for grave-yards.

proud. We made a bully fite, Selah, and 10 about going to kawlidge. The truth is, the whole American nation ought to feel proud of it. It shows what Americans can do when they think they are imposed on-so-called.' Did n't our four fathers fight, bleed, and die about a little tax on 15 tea, when not one in a thousand drunk it? Bekaus they succeeded, was n't it glory? But if they had n't, I suppose it would have been treason, and they would have been bowin and scrapin round King 20 George for pardon. So it goes, Artemus, and to my mind, if the whole thing was stewed down it would make about a half pint of humbug. We had good men, great men, Christian men, who thought we was right, and many of 'em have gone to the undiscovered country, and have got a pardon as is a pardon. When I die I am mighty willing to risk myself under the shadow of their wings, whether the cli- 30 mate be hot or cold. So mote it be. Selah!

Well, my friend, I don't want much. I ain't ambitious, as I used to was. You all have got your shows and monkeys and sircusses and brass band and organs, and can play on the petrolyum and the harp of a thousand strings, and so on, but I've got only one favor to ax you. I want Well, maybe I'v said enough. But I enough powder to kill a big yaller stumpdon't feel easy yet. I'm a good Union tail dog that prowls around my premises man, certain and sure. I've had my 35 at night. Pon honor, I won't shoot at breeches died blue, and I've bot a blue anything blue or black or mulatter. Will bucket, and I very often feel blue, and you send it? Are you and your folks so about twice in a while I go to the dog- skeered of me and my folks that you won't gery and git blue, and then I look up at let us have any ammunition? Are the the blue serulean heavens and sing the 40 squirrels and crows and black racoons to melancholy chorus of the Blue-tailed fly. eat up our poor little corn-patches? Are I'm doin my durndest to harmonize, and the wild turkeys to gobble all around us I think I could sucseed if it was n't for with impunity? If a mad dog takes the sum things. When I see a black-guard hiderphoby, is the whole community to goin around the streets with a gun on his 45 run itself to death to get out of the way? shoulder, why right then, for a few min- I golly! it looks like your people had all utes, I hate the whole Yanky nation. Je- took the rebelfoby for good, and was never rusalem! how my blood biles! The insti- gwine to get over it. See here, my friend, tution that was handed down to us by the you must send me a little powder and a heavenly kingdom of Massachusetts, now 50 ticket to your show, and me and you will

harmonize sertin.

With these few remarks I think I feel better, and hope I hain't made nobody fitin mad, for I'm not on that line at this

put over us with powder and ball! Har-
monize the devil! Ain't we human be-
ings? Ain't we got eyes and ears and
feelin and thinkin? Why, the whole of
Africa has cum to town, women and chil- 55 time.
dren and babies and baboons and all. A
man can tell how fur it is to the city by

the smell better than by the milepost.

I am truly your friend, all present of accounted for.

BILL ARP, So-called.

P. S.- Old man Harris wanted to buy my fiddle the other day with Confederit money. He sed it would be good agin. He says Jim Funderbuk told him that Warren's Jack seen a man who had jest come from Virginny, and he said a man had told his cousin Mandy that Lee had whipped 'em agin. Old Harris says that a feller by the name of Mack C. Million is coming over with a million of men. 10 But nevertheless, notwithstandin, somehow, or somehow else, I'm dubus about the money. If you was me, Artemus, would you make the fiddle trade?

From Bill Arp, So Called, 1866.

away his pile, returns, you kill calves and sich.' Then the old man retorts, sayin,

My son who wuz lost is found; the sheep who went astray is cum back; let us be 5 merry.'

My brethren, this parable applize ez well to the present time ez though it wuz made for it. Uncle Samyuel is the old man, the Suthern wing uv the Dimekratik party is the proddygal, and the Abolishnists is the oldest son. The South got tired, and went off on its own hook. It hez, I maik no doubt, spent the heft uv its substance, and will shortly conclude 15 to cum home. Now, the grate question uv the hour is - How shel he be reseeved? My frends, the Dimekratik roo! is to foller the scripter wen yoo can make a pint by so doin. In this pertikeler case, 20 godlinis is gane. Halleloogy! therefour, let us be godly. Let Uncle Samyuel see the repentant proddygal afar orf - let him go out to seek him, er send Fernandywood, and when he haz found him, let him 25 fall, not upon his neck, but at his feet let him put on to him the purple robe, wich is royalty, and upon his hand a ring, wich is dominion, wich is a improvement upon Scripter.

January the 31st, 1864. MY BRETHREN AND SISTEREN: I shall maik sum remarks this mornin based upon the bootiful Parable of the Proddygal 30 Sun. I wood reed 2 yoo the passij, but the Bible I hev is the only wun in the township, and I lent it yisterday 2 Square Gavitt, who sed swarin witnesses on almanacs woodent do in hoss cases, and he 35 hase n't brung it back. The skripter sez, in substance:

Ther was a certin man who hed 2 suns. The yungist hed a taist for that branch of agricultooral persoots known ez soowin 40 wild oats, so he askt the old man for his sheer in the estait. He got it, turnd it into greenbax, and went off. He commenst livin high-bording at big hotels, and keepin trottin hosses, and playin bil-45 yards, and sich. In about a year he run thro his pile, and wuz ded broak. Then his credit playd out, and he wuz in a tight place for his daily bred. The idee struck him that he had better put for hum, wich 50 he did. The old man saw him cumin, and he run out and met him, and giv him a new cote, and a order for a pare uv shoes, and kild a fat caff, and hed flour doins. The oldest boy obgected 2 these, sayin, 55 Lo, I hev servd thee these menny yeres, and thou never madest no splurge over me, but when this thy son, who hez fooled

But the Abolishnist, who is the elder son, steps up and sez: 'Nary. He wuz a doin well, and he wented out frum us, takin awl that wuz his own, and sech ez he cood steel, all uv wich he hez spent upon such harlots as Afrikin Slaivry, Stait Rites, and Suthern Independence, wich last two menshund is whited sepulkers. I sent my sons, Grant and Rosycrance, and Benbutler after him; but, lo! wen he wuz strong and wiggerus, he did despitefully use them. Now that he is week from hunger, let him brindle. Ef we take him to our buzems, let him cum on his knees; let him cast off the harlots that hev sedoost him, that ther may be no moar trubble in all the land.'

My brethren, we must taik him back ez the old man did in the Bible. Why? do you ask. Becoz he wuz alluz the old man's pet, and had things his own way. We wuz his frends, and shared with him the steelins, but sence we went out, the Abolishn brother and his frends hev controld things, and whare air we? Eko ansers, No whair! We okepy low plasis in the sinagog, and the doggery-keepers go mournin about the streets, and refuse to be comforted, becoz ther cash is not,

SAMUEL LANGHORNE CLEMENS (1835-1910)

Samuel L. Clemens, or "Mark Twain " as he is better known to readers, was the first literary man of high rank to be born west of the Mississippi. His father was a member of that restless horde who during the greater part of the nineteenth century pushed westward into the new lands of the Mississippi and beyond, their picturesque caravans and border settlements making romantic a whole era of our history. It was at Florida, Missouri, on the west bank of the great river, that he finally settled, and it was in the shiftless river town of Hannibal, made vivid to us by the adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, that the future humorist spent his boyhood. His schooling was meager. He found work early in the local printing office, learned his trade in due time, and at eighteen, longing for a glimpse of the world, he started on a tramp trip east, supporting himself as a typesettter as he went. Thus he saw New York and Philadelphia. Fifteen months later, he was back again, now as a "cub" on one of the river boats, and after eighteen months he realized the first great ambition of his life, he was e, professional pilot on the Mississippi.

Suddenly, however, he found his profession useless. The war had broken out, and the river was closed. Out of employment, he went home, served for a time in an improvised troop which tried to join the Confederate army, and then, his brother Orion having been appointed secretary to the Governor of Nevada, he started with him by stage coach across the plains. The next period of his life reads like romance: he saw the beginnings of the picturesque new state, reported its first legislative sessions, joined the excited tide of gold-seekers which was moving ever into the mountains, lived for two years at Virginia City, the home of the Comstock lode at its highest boom period, drifted down to San Francisco and became acquainted with Bret Harte and his circle, was connected with the city papers and for them made at one time a trip to the Sandwich Islands, as they were then called, and at length drifted again into the Sierras as a pocket miner and adventurer.

The next period of his life began in 1867 when he went to New York to publish his first book, The Jumping Frog. While there he was attracted by a notice that The Quaker City was to start early in the summer with a personally conducted band of tourists for the Mediterranean lands. With a commission from The Alta California newspaper for letters, he joined it. The letters finally became Innocents Abroad, 1869, and from the date of its publication its author became a man of letters with a constantly increasing fame. Ile was married to Miss Olivia Langdon of Elmira, New York, lived in her home town for a time, then moved to Hartford, Connecticut, which he thenceforth made his home. He traveled much abroad. and after the failure of his publishing house which plunged him heavily in debt, made a prolonged lecture trip through all the English-speaking parts of the world, finally, like Sir Walter Scott, succeeding in clearing himself of all obligations.

His writings fall into three classes: books like Roughing It, Life on the Mississippi, Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn, which may be termed studies in the romance of early American life; secondly, his purely humorous work, like The Jumping Frog and much of his earlier farce; and thirdly, his more serious work, like his Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc, and his purpose stories like The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg. Of these the first are the most valuable. He has shown with rare faithfulness a picturesque area of American life that has passed away forever.

THE CELEBRATED JUMPING FROG
OF CALAVERAS COUNTY 1

In compliance with the request of a

friend of mine, who wrote me from the East, I called on good-natured, garrulous

1 Published by express permission of the Trustees of the Estate of Samuel L. Clemens, the Mark

Twain Company and Harper & Brothers, Publishers

old Simon Wheeler, and inquired after my friend's friend, Leonidas W. Smiley as requested to do, and I hereunto append the result. I have a lurking susspicion that Leonidas W. Smiley is a myth: that my friend never knew such a personage; and that he only conjectured that. if I asked old Wheeler about him, it would remind him of his infamous Jim Smilev. to and he would go to work and bore me