Mark Twain - Moments with Mark Twain

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ISBN 978-1-64974-006-9

by Mark Twain

Beginning his preface to the Uniform Edition of his works, Mark Twain wrote:

So far as I remember, I have never seen an Authors Preface which had any purpose but oneto furnish reasons for the publication of the book. Prefaces wear many disguises, call themselves by various names, and pretend to come on various businesses, but I think that upon examination we are quite sure to find that their errand is always the same: they are there to apologize for the book; in other words, furnish reasons for its publication. This often insures brevity.

Accepting the above as gospel (as necessarily we must, in this book,) one is only required here to furnish a few more or less plausible excuses for its existence. Very well, then, we can think of two:

First: To prove to those who have read Mark Twain sparingly, or know him mainly from hearsay, that he was something more than a mere fun-maker.

Second: To provide for those who have read largely of his work something of its essence, as it wereput up in a form which may be found convenient when one has not time, or inclination, to search the volumes.

These are the excusesnow, an added word as to method: The examples have been arranged chronologically, so that the reader, following them in order, may note the authors evolutionthe development of his humor, his observation, his philosophy and his literary style. They have been selected with some care, in the hope that those who know the author best may consider him fairly represented.

Feeling now that this little volume is sufficiently explained, the compiler begs to offer it, without further extenuation, to all who do honor to the memory of our foremost laughing philosopher.

Answers to Correspondents

Moral Statistician.I dont want any of your statistics; I took your whole batch and lit my pipe with it. I hate your kind of people. You are always ciphering out how much a mans health is injured, and how much his intellect is impaired, and how many pitiful dollars and cents he wastes in the course of ninety-two years indulgence in the fatal practice of smoking; and in the equally fatal practice of drinking coffee; and in playing billiards occasionally; and in taking a glass of wine at dinner, etc., etc., etc. And you are always figuring out how many women have been burned to death because of the dangerous fashion of wearing expansive hoops, etc., etc., etc. You never see more than one side of the question. You are blind to the fact that most old men in America smoke, and drink coffee, although, according to your theory, they ought to have died young; and that hearty old Englishmen drink wine and survive it, and portly old Dutchmen both drink and smoke freely, and yet grow older and fatter all the time. And you never try to find out how much solid comfort, relaxation, and enjoyment a man derives from smoking in the course of a lifetime (which is worth ten times the money he would save by letting it alone), nor the appalling aggregate of happiness lost in a lifetime by your kind of people from not smoking. Of course you can save money by denying yourself all those little vicious enjoyments for fifty years; but then what can you do with it? What use can you put it to? Money cant save your infinitesimal soul. All the use that money can be put to is to purchase comfort and enjoyment in this life; therefore, as you are an enemy to comfort and enjoyment, where is the use of accumulating cash? It wont do for you to say that you can use it to better purpose in furnishing a good table, and in charities, and in supporting tract societies, because you know yourself that you people who have no petty vices are never known to give away a cent, and that you stint yourselves so in the matter of food that you are always feeble and hungry. And you never dare to laugh in the daytime for fear some poor wretch, seeing you in a good humor, will try to borrow a dollar of you; and in church you are always down on your knees, with your eyes buried in the cushion, when the contribution box comes around; and you never give the revenue officers a full statement of your income. Now you know all these things yourself, dont you? Very well, then, what is the use of your stringing out your miserable lives to a lean and withered old age? What is the use of your saving money that is so utterly worthless to you? In a word, why dont you go off somewhere and die, and not be always trying to seduce people into becoming as ornery and unloveable as you are yourselves, by your villainous moral statistics? Now I dont approve of dissipation, and I dont indulge in it, either; but I havent a particle of confidence in a man who has no redeeming petty vices, and so I dont want to hear from you any more. I think you are the very same man who read me a long lecture last week about the degrading vice of smoking cigars, and then came back, in my absence, with your reprehensible fireproof gloves on, and carried off my beautiful parlor stove.

Young Author.Yes, Agassiz does recommend authors to eat fish, because the phosphorus in it makes brain. So far you are correct. But I cannot help you to a decision about the amount you need to eatat least, not with certainty. If the specimen composition you send is about your fair usual average, I should judge that perhaps a couple of whales would be all you would want for the present. Not the largest kind, but simply good, middling-sized whales.

How I Edited an Agricultural Paper

In about half an hour an old gentleman, with a flowing beard and a fine but rather austere face, entered, and sat down at my invitation. He seemed to have something on his mind. He took off his hat and set it on the floor, and got out of it a red silk handkerchief and a copy of our paper.

He put the paper on his lap, and while he polished his spectacles with his handkerchief, he said, Are you the new editor?

I said I was.

Have you ever edited an agricultural paper before?

No, I said; this is my first attempt.

Very likely. Have you had any experience in agriculture, practically?

No; I believe I have not.

Some instinct told me, said the old gentleman, putting on his spectacles and looking over them at me with asperity, while he folded his paper into a convenient shape. I wish to read you what must have made me have that instinct. It was this editorial. Listen, and see if it was you that wrote it:

Turnips should never be pulled, it injures them. It is much better to send a boy up and let him shake the tree.

Now, what do you think of that?for I really suppose you wrote it?

Think of it? Why, I think it is good. I think it is sense. I have no doubt that every year millions and millions of bushels of turnips are spoiled in this township alone by being pulled in a half-ripe condition, when, if they had sent a boy up to shake the tree

Shake your grandmother! Turnips dont grow on trees!

Oh, they dont dont they? Well, who said they did? The language was intended to be figurative, wholly figurative. Anybody that knows anything will know that I meant that the boy should shake the vine.