Mark Twain's Letters Part 72

To W. D. Howells, in Boston:

ELMIRA, Sept. 17, '84.

MY DEAR HOWELLS,--Somehow I can't seem to rest quiet under the idea of your voting for Blaine. I believe you said something about the country and the party. Certainly allegiance to these is well; but as certainly a man's first duty is to his own conscience and honor--the party or the country come second to that, and never first. I don't ask you to vote at all--I only urge you to not soil yourself by voting for Blaine.

When you wrote before, you were able to say the charges against him were not proven. But you know now that they are proven, and it seems to me that that bars you and all other honest and honorable men (who are independently situated) from voting for him.

It is not necessary to vote for Cleveland; the only necessary thing to do, as I understand it, is that a man shall keep himself clean, (by withholding his vote for an improper man) even though the party and the country go to destruction in consequence. It is not parties that make or save countries or that build them to greatness--it is clean men, clean ordinary citizens, rank and file, the ma.s.ses. Clean ma.s.ses are not made by individuals standing back till the rest become clean.

As I said before, I think a man's first duty is to his own honor; not to his country and not to his party. Don't be offended; I mean no offence.

I am not so concerned about the rest of the nation, but--well, good-bye.

Ys Ever MARK.

There does not appear to be any further discussion of the matter between Howells and Clemens. Their letters for a time contained no suggestion of politics.

Perhaps Mark Twain's own political conscience was not entirely clear in his repudiation of his party; at least we may believe from his next letter that his Cleveland enthusiasm was qualified by a willingness to support a Republican who would command his admiration and honor. The idea of an eleventh-hour nomination was rather startling, whatever its motive.

To Mr. Pierce, in Boston:

HARTFORD, Oct. 22, '84.

MY DEAR MR. PIERCE,--You know, as well as I do, that the reason the majority of republicans are going to vote for Blaine is because they feel that they cannot help themselves. Do not you believe that if Mr. Edmunds would consent to run for President, on the Independent ticket--even at this late day--he might be elected?

Well, if he wouldn't consent, but should even strenuously protest and say he wouldn't serve if elected, isn't it still wise and fair to nominate him and vote for him? since his protest would relieve him from all responsibility; and he couldn't surely find fault with people for forcing a compliment upon him. And do not you believe that his name thus compulsorily placed at the head of the Independent column would work absolutely certain defeat to Blain and save the country's honor?

Politicians often carry a victory by springing some disgraceful and rascally mine under the feet of the adversary at the eleventh hour; would it not be wholesome to vary this thing for once and spring as formidable a mine of a better sort under the enemy's works?

If Edmunds's name were put up, I would vote for him in the teeth of all the protesting and blaspheming he could do in a month; and there are lots of others who would do likewise.

If this notion is not a foolish and wicked one, won't you just consult with some chief Independents, and see if they won't call a sudden convention and whoop the thing through? To nominate Edmunds the 1st of November, would be soon enough, wouldn't it?

With kindest regards to you and the Aldriches,

Yr Truly S. L. CLEMENS.

Clemens and Cable set out on their reading-tour in November.

They were a curiously-a.s.sorted pair: Cable was of orthodox religion, exact as to habits, neat, prim, all that Clemens was not. In the beginning Cable undertook to read the Bible aloud to Clemens each evening, but this part of the day's program was presently omitted by request. If they spent Sunday in a town, Cable was up bright and early visiting the various churches and Sunday-schools, while Mark Twain remained at the hotel, in bed, reading or asleep.

XXV. THE GREAT YEAR OF 1885. CLEMENS AND CABLE. PUBLICATION OF "HUCK FINN." THE GRANT MEMOIRS. MARK TWAIN AT FIFTY.

The year 1885 was in some respects the most important, certainly the most pleasantly exciting, in Mark Twain's life. It was the year in which he entered fully into the publis.h.i.+ng business and launched one of the most spectacular of all publis.h.i.+ng adventures, The Personal Memoirs of General U. S. Grant. Clemens had not intended to do general publis.h.i.+ng when he arranged with Webster to become sales-agent for the Mississippi book, and later general agent for Huck Finn's adventures; he had intended only to handle his own books, because he was pretty thoroughly dissatisfied with other publis.h.i.+ng arrangements. Even the Library of Humor, which Howells, with Clark, of the Courant, had put together for him, he left with Osgood until that publisher failed, during the spring of 1885.

Certainly he never dreamed of undertaking anything of the proportions of the Grant book.

He had always believed that Grant could make a book. More than once, when they had met, he had urged the General to prepare his memoirs for publication. Howells, in his 'My Mark Twain', tells of going with Clemens to see Grant, then a member of the ill-fated firm of Grant and Ward, and how they lunched on beans, bacon and coffee brought in from a near-by restaurant. It was while they were eating this soldier fare that Clemens--very likely abetted by Howells --especially urged the great commander to prepare his memoirs. But Grant had become a financier, as he believed, and the prospect of literary earnings, however large, did not appeal to him.

Furthermore, he was convinced that he was without literary ability and that a book by him would prove a failure.

But then, by and by, came a failure more disastrous than anything he had foreseen--the downfall of his firm through the Napoleonic rascality of Ward. General Grant was utterly ruined; he was left without income and apparently without the means of earning one. It was the period when the great War Series was appeasing in the Century Magazine. General Grant, hard-pressed, was induced by the editors to prepare one or more articles, and, finding that he could write them, became interested in the idea of a book. It is unnecessary to repeat here the story of how the publication of this important work pa.s.sed into the hands of Mark Twain; that is to say, the firm of Charles L. Webster & Co., the details having been fully given elsewhere.--[See Mark Twain: A Biography, chap. cliv.]--

We will now return for the moment to other matters, as reported in order by the letters. Clemens and Cable had continued their reading-tour into Canada, and in February found themselves in Montreal. Here they were invited by the Toque Bleue Snow-shoe Club to join in one of their weekly excursions across Mt. Royal. They could not go, and the reasons given by Mark Twain are not without interest. The letter is to Mr. George Iles, author of Flame, Electricity, and the Camera, and many other useful works.

To George Iles, far the Toque Blew Snow-shoe Club, Montreal:

DETROIT, February 12, 1885.

Midnight, P.S.

MY DEAR ILES,--I got your other telegram a while ago, and answered it, explaining that I get only a couple of hours in the middle of the day for social life. I know it doesn't seem rational that a man should have to lie abed all day in order to be rested and equipped for talking an hour at night, and yet in my case and Cable's it is so. Unless I get a great deal of rest, a ghastly dulness settles down upon me on the platform, and turns my performance into work, and hard work, whereas it ought always to be pastime, recreation, solid enjoyment. Usually it is just this latter, but that is because I take my rest faithfully, and prepare myself to do my duty by my audience.

I am the obliged and appreciative servant of my brethren of the Snow-shoe Club, and nothing in the world would delight me more than to come to their house without naming time or terms on my own part--but you see how it is. My cast iron duty is to my audience--it leaves me no liberty and no option.

With kindest regards to the Club, and to you,

I am Sincerely yours

S. L. CLEMENS.

In the next letter we reach the end of the Clemens-Cable venture and get a characteristic summing up of Mark Twain's general att.i.tude toward the companion of his travels. It must be read only in the clear realization of Mark Twain's att.i.tude toward orthodoxy, and his habit of humor. Cable was as rigidly orthodox as Mark Twain was revolutionary. The two were never anything but the best of friends.

To W. D. Howells, in Boston:

PHILADA. Feb. 27, '85.

MY DEAR HOWELLS,--To-night in Baltimore, to-morrow afternoon and night in Was.h.i.+ngton, and my four-months platform campaign is ended at last.

It has been a curious experience. It has taught me that Cable's gifts of mind are greater and higher than I had suspected. But--

That "But" is pointing toward his religion. You will never, never know, never divine, guess, imagine, how loathsome a thing the Christian religion can be made until you come to know and study Cable daily and hourly. Mind you, I like him; he is pleasant company; I rage and swear at him sometimes, but we do not quarrel; we get along mighty happily together; but in him and his person I have learned to hate all religions. He has taught me to abhor and detest the Sabbath-day and hunt up new and troublesome ways to dishonor it.

Nat Goodwin was on the train yesterday. He plays in Was.h.i.+ngton all the coming week. He is very anxious to get our Sellers play and play it under changed names. I said the only thing I could do would be to write to you. Well, I've done it.