... I confine myself to life with which I am familiar whenpretending to portray life. But I confined myself to the boy-lifeout on the Mississippi because that had a peculiar charm for me, andnot because I was not familiar with other phases of life. I was asoldier two weeks once in the beginning of the war, and was huntedlike a rat the whole time. Familiar? My splendid Kipling himselfhasn't a more burnt-in, hard-baked, and unforgetable familiaritywith that death-on-the-pale-horse-with-hell-following-after, whichis a raw soldier's first fortnight in the field—and which, withoutany doubt, is the most tremendous fortnight and the vividest he isever going to see.Yes, and I have shoveled silver tailings in a quartz-mill a coupleof weeks, and acquired the last possibilities of culture in thatdirection. And I've done “pocket-mining” during three months in theone little patch of ground in the whole globe where Nature concealsgold in pockets—or did before we robbed all of those pockets andexhausted, obliterated, annihilated the most curious freak Natureever indulged in. There are not thirty men left alive who, beingtold there was a pocket hidden on the broad slope of a mountain,would know how to go and find it, or have even the faintest idea ofhow to set about it; but I am one of the possible 20 or 30 whopossess the secret, and I could go and put my hand on that hiddentreasure with a most deadly precision.And I've been a prospector, and know pay rock from poor when I findit—just with a touch of the tongue. And I've been a silver minerand know how to dig and shovel and drill and put in a blast. And soI know the mines and the miners interiorly as well as Bret Harteknows them exteriorly.And I was a newspaper reporter four years in cities, and so saw theinside of many things; and was reporter in a legislature twosessions and the same in Congress one session, and thus learned toknow personally three sample bodies of the smallest minds and theselfishest souls and the cowardliest hearts that God makes.And I was some years a Mississippi pilot, and familiarly knew allthe different kinds of steamboatmen—a race apart, and not likeother folk.And I was for some years a traveling “jour” printer, and wanderedfrom city to city—and so I know that sect familiarly.And I was a lecturer on the public platform a number of seasons andwas a responder to toasts at all the different kinds of banquets—and so I know a great many secrets about audiences—secrets not tobe got out of books, but only acquirable by experience.And I watched over one dear project of mine for years, spent afortune on it, and failed to make it go—and the history of thatwould make a large book in which a million men would see themselvesas in a mirror; and they would testify and say, Verily, this is notimagination; this fellow has been there—and after would they castdust upon their heads, cursing and blaspheming.And I am a publisher, and did pay to one author's widow (GeneralGrant's) the largest copyright checks this world has seen—aggregating more than L80,000 in the first year.And I have been an author for 20 years and an ass for 55.Now then: as the most valuable capital or culture or educationusable in the building of novels is personal experience I ought tobe well equipped for that trade.I surely have the equipment, a wide culture, and all of it real,none of it artificial, for I don't know anything about books.
This generous bill of literary particulars was fully warranted. Mark Twain's equipment was equal to his occasions. It is true that he was no longer young, and that his health was not perfect, but his resolution and his energy had not waned.
His need was imminent and he lost no time. He dug out from his pigeonholes such materials as he had in stock, selecting a few completed manuscripts for immediate disposal—among them his old article entitled, “Mental Telegraphy,” written in 1878, when he had hesitated to offer it, in the fear that it would not be accepted by the public otherwise than as a joke. He added to it now a supplement and sent it to Mr. Alden, of Harper's Magazine.
Psychic interest had progressed in twelve years; also Mark Twain had come to be rather more seriously regarded. The article was accepted promptly!—[The publication of this article created a good deal of a stir and resulted in the first general recognition of what later became known as Telepathy. A good many readers insisted on regarding the whole matter as one of Mark Twain's jokes, but its serious acceptance was much wider.]—The old sketch, “Luck,” also found its way to Harper's Magazine, and other manuscripts were looked over and furbished up with a view to their disposal. Even the history game was dragged from the dust of its retirement, and Hall was instructed to investigate its chance of profit.
Then Mark Twain went to work in earnest. Within a week after the collapse of the Jones bubble he was hard at work on a new book—the transmigration of the old “Claimant” play into a novel.
Ever since the appearance of the Yankee there had been what was evidently a concerted movement to induce him to write a novel with the theories of Henry George as the central idea. Letters from every direction had urged him to undertake such a story, and these had suggested a more serious purpose for the Claimant book. A motif in which there is a young lord who renounces his heritage and class to come to America and labor with his hands; who attends socialistic meetings at which men inspired by readings of 'Progress and Poverty' and 'Looking Backward' address their brothers of toil, could have in it something worth while. Clemens inserted portions of some of his discarded essays in these addresses, and had he developed this element further, and abandoned Colonel Sellers's materialization lunacies to the oblivion they had earned, the result might have been more fortunate.
But his faith in the new Sellers had never died, and the temptation to use scenes from the abandoned play proved to be too strong to be resisted. The result was incongruous enough. The author, however, admired it amazingly at the time. He sent Howells stirring reports of his progress. He wrote Hall that the book would be ready soon and that there must be seventy-five thousand orders by the date of issue, “not a single one short of that.” Then suddenly, at the end of February, the rheumatism came back into his shoulder and right arm and he could hardly hold the pen. He conceived the idea of dictating into a phonograph, and wrote Howells to test this invention and find out as to terms for three months, with cylinders enough to carry one hundred and seventy-five thousand words.
I don't want to erase any of them. My right arm is nearly disabledby rheumatism, but I am bound to write this book (and sell 100,000copies of it-no, I mean 1,000,000—next fall). I feel sure I candictate the book into a phonograph if I don't have to yell. I write2,000 words a day. I think I can dictate twice as many.But mind, if this is going to be too much trouble to you—go aheadand do it all the same.
Howells replied encouragingly. He had talked a letter into a phonograph and the phonograph man had talked his answer into it, after which the cylinder had been taken to a typewriter in the-next room and correctly written out. If a man had the “cheek” to dictate his story into a phonograph, Howells said, all the rest seemed perfectly easy.
Clemens ordered a phonograph and gave it a pretty fair trial. It was only a partial success. He said he couldn't write literature with it because it hadn't any ideas or gift for elaboration, but was just as matter-of-fact, compressive and unresponsive, grave and unsmiling as the devil—a poor audience.
I filled four dozen cylinders in two sittings, then I found I could havesaid it about as easy with the pen, and said it a deal better. Then Iresigned.
He did not immediately give it up. To relieve his aching arm he alternated the phonograph with the pen, and the work progressed rapidly. Early in May he was arranging for its serial disposition, and it was eventually sold for twelve thousand dollars to the McClure Syndicate, who placed it with a number of papers in America and with the Idler Magazine in England. W. M. Laffan, of the Sun, an old and tried friend, combined with McClure in the arrangement. Laffan also proposed to join with McClure in paying Mark Twain a thousand dollars each for a series of six European letters. This was toward the end of May, 1891, when Clemens had already decided upon a long European sojourn.
There were several reasons why this was desirable. Neither Clemens nor his wife was in good health. Both of them were troubled with rheumatism, and a council of physicians had agreed that Mrs. Clemens had some disturbance of the heart. The death of Charles L. Webster in April—the fourth death among relatives in two years—had renewed her forebodings. Susy, who had been at Bryn Mawr, had returned far from well. The European baths and the change of travel it was believed would be beneficial to the family health. Furthermore, the maintenance of the Hartford home was far too costly for their present and prospective income. The house with its associations of seventeen incomparable years must be closed. A great period had ended.
They arranged to sail on the 6th of June by the French line.—[On the Gascogne.]—Mrs. Crane was to accompany them, and came over in April to help in breaking the news to the servants. John and Ellen O'Neill (the gardener and his wife) were to remain in charge; places were found for George and Patrick. Katie Leary was retained to accompany the family. It was a sad dissolution.
The day came for departure and the carriage was at the door. Mrs. Clemens did not come immediately. She was looking into the rooms, bidding a kind of silent good-by to the home she had made and to all its memories. Following the others she entered the carriage, and Patrick McAleer drove them together for the last time. They were going on a long journey. They did not guess how long, or that the place would never be home to them again.
They landed at Havre and went directly to Paris, where they remained about a week. From Paris Clemens wrote to Hall that a deal by which he had hoped to sell out his interest in the type-setter to the Mallorys, of the Churchman, had fallen through.
“Therefore,” he said, “you will have to modify your instalment system to meet the emergency of a constipated purse; for if you should need to borrow any more money I would not know how or where to raise it.”
The Clemens party went to Geneva, then rested for a time at the baths of Aix; from Aix to Bayreuth to attend the Wagner festival, and from Bayreuth to Marienbad for further additions of health. Clemens began writing his newspaper letters at Aix, the first of which consists of observations at that “paradise of rheumatics.” This letter is really a careful and faithful description of Aix-les-Bains, with no particular drift of humor in it. He tells how in his own case the baths at first developed plenty of pain, but that the subsequent ones removed almost all of it.
“I've got back the use of my arm the last few days, and I am going away now,” he says, and concludes by describing the beautiful drives and scenery about Aix—the pleasures to be found paddling on little Lake Bourget and the happy excursions to Annecy.
At the end of an hour you come to Annecy and rattle through its oldcrooked lanes, built solidly up with curious old houses that are adream of the Middle Ages, and presently you come to the main objectof your trip—Lake Annecy. It is a revelation. It is a miracle.It brings the tears to a body's eyes. It is so enchanting. That isto say, it affects you just as all other things that you instantlyrecognize as perfect affect you—perfect music, perfect eloquence,perfect art, perfect joy, perfect grief.
He was getting back into his old descriptive swing, but his dislike for travel was against him, and he found writing the letters hard. From Bayreuth he wrote “At the Shrine of St. Wagner,” one of the best descriptions of that great musical festival that has been put into words. He paid full tribute to the performance, also to the Wagner devotion, confessing its genuineness.
This opera of “Tristan and Isolde” last night broke the hearts ofall witnesses who were of the faith, and I know of some, and haveheard of many, who could not sleep after it, but cried the nightaway. I feel strongly out of place here. Sometimes I feel like theone sane person in the community of the mad; sometimes I feel likethe one blind man where all others see; the one groping savage inthe college of the learned, and always during service I feel like aheretic in heaven.
He tells how he really enjoyed two of the operas, and rejoiced in supposing that his musical regeneration was accomplished and perfected; but alas! he was informed by experts that those particular events were not real music at all. Then he says:
Well, I ought to have recognized the sign the old, sure sign thathas never failed me in matters of art. Whenever I enjoy anything inart it means that it is mighty poor. The private knowledge of thisfact has saved me from going to pieces with enthusiasm in front ofmany and many a chromo. However, my base instinct does bring meprofit sometimes; I was the only man out of 3,200 who got his moneyback on those two operas.
His third letter was from Marienbad, in Bohemia, another “health-factory,” as he calls it, and is of the same general character as those preceding. In his fourth letter he told how he himself took charge of the family fortunes and became courier from Aix to Bayreuth. It is a very delightful letter, most of it, and probably not greatly burlesqued or exaggerated in its details. It is included now in the “Complete Works,” as fresh and delightful as ever. They returned to Germany at the end of August, to Nuremberg, which he notes as the “city of exquisite glimpses,” and to Heidelberg, where they had their old apartment of thirteen years before, Room 40 at the Schloss Hotel, with its wonderful prospect of wood and hill, and the haze-haunted valley of the Rhine. They remained less than a week in that beautiful place, and then were off for Switzerland, Lucerne, Brienz, Interlaken, finally resting at the Hotel Beau Rivage, Ouchy, Lausanne, on beautiful Lake Leman.
Clemens had agreed to write six of the newspaper letters, and he had by this time finished five of them, the fifth being dated from Interlaken, its subject, “Switzerland, the Cradle of Liberty.” He wrote to Hall that it was his intention to write another book of travel and to take a year or two to collect the material. The Century editors were after him for a series after the style of Innocents Abroad. He considered this suggestion, but declined by cable, explaining to Hall that he intended to write for serial publication no more than the six newspaper letters. He said:
To write a book of travel would be less trouble than to write sixdetached chapters. Each of these letters requires the same varietyof treatment and subject that one puts into a book; but in the bookeach chapter doesn't have to be rounded and complete in itself.
He suggested that the six letters be gathered into a small volume which would contain about thirty-five or forty thousand words, to be sold as low as twenty-five cents, but this idea appears to have been dropped.
At Ouchy Clemens conceived the idea of taking a little trip on his own account, an excursion that would be a rest after the strenuous three months' travel and sightseeing—one that he could turn into literature. He engaged Joseph Very, a courier used during their earlier European travels, and highly recommended in the Tramp Abroad. He sent Joseph over to Lake Bourget to engage a boat and a boatman for a ten days' trip down the river Rhone. For five dollars Joseph bought a safe, flat-bottom craft; also he engaged the owner as pilot. A few days later—September 19—Clemens followed. They stopped overnight on an island in Lake Bourget, and in his notes Clemens tells how he slept in the old castle of Chatillon, in the room where a pope was born. They started on their drift next morning. To Mrs. Clemens, in some good-by memoranda, he said:
The lake is as smooth as glass; a brilliant sun is shining.Our boat is so comfortable and shady with its awning.11.20. We have crossed the lake and are entering the canal. Shallpresently be in the Rhone.Noon. Nearly down to the Rhone, passing the village of Chanaz.Sunday, 3.15 P.M. We have been in the Rhone three hours. Itis unimaginably still & reposeful & cool & soft & breezy. No rowingor work of any kind to do—we merely float with the current we glidenoiseless and swift—as fast as a London cab-horse rips along—8miles an hour—the swiftest current I've ever boated in. We have theentire river to ourselves nowhere a boat of any kind.
Pleasant it must have been in the warm September days to go swinging down that swift, gray stream which comes racing out of Switzerland into France, fed from a thousand glaciers. He sent almost daily memoranda of his progress. Half-way to Arles he wrote:
It's too delicious, floating with the swift current under theawning these superb, sunshiny days in deep peace and quietness.Some of these curious old historical towns strangely persuade me,but it is so lovely afloat that I don't stop, but view them from theoutside and sail on. We get abundance of grapes and peaches fornext to nothing. My, but that inn was suffocating with garlic wherewe stayed last night! I had to hold my nose as we went up-stairs orI believe I should have fainted.Little bit of a room, rude board floor unswept, 2 chairs, unpaintedwhite pine table—void the furniture! Had a good firm bed, solid asa rock, & you could have brained an ox with the bolster.These six hours have been entirely delightful. I want to do all therivers of Europe in an open boat in summer weather.
Still further along he described one of their shore accommodations.
Night caught us yesterday where we had to take quarters in apeasant's house which was occupied by the family and a lot of cows &calves, also several rabbits.—[His word for fleas. Neither fleasnor mosquitoes ever bit him—probably because of his steady use oftobacco.]—The latter had a ball & I was the ballroom; but theywere very friendly and didn't bite.The peasants were mighty kind and hearty & flew around & did theirbest to make us comfortable. This morning I breakfasted on theshore in the open air with two sociable dogs & a cat. Clean cloth,napkins & table furniture, white sugar, a vast hunk of excellentbutter, good bread, first-class coffee with pure milk, fried fishjust caught. Wonderful that so much cleanliness should come out ofsuch a phenomenally dirty house.An hour ago we saw the Falls of the Rhone, a prodigiously rough anddangerous-looking place; shipped a little water, but came to noharm. It was one of the most beautiful pieces of piloting & boatmanagement I ever saw. Our admiral knew his business.We have had to run ashore for shelter every time it has rainedheretofore, but Joseph has been putting in his odd time making awaterproof sun-bonnet for the boat, & now we sail along dry,although we have had many heavy showers this morning.
Here follows a pencil-drawing of the boat and its new awning, and he adds: “I'm on the stern, under the shelter, and out of sight.”
The trip down the Rhone proved more valuable as an outing than as literary material. Clemens covered one hundred and seventy-four pages with his notes of it, then gave it up. Traveling alone with no one but Joseph and the Admiral (former owner of the craft) was reposeful and satisfactory, but it did not inspire literary flights. He tried to rectify the lack of companionship by introducing fictitious characters, such as Uncle Abner, Fargo, and Stavely, a young artist; also Harris, from the Tramp Abroad; but Harris was not really there this time, and Mark Twain's genius, given rather to elaboration than to construction, found it too severe a task to imagine a string of adventures without at least the customary ten per cent. of fact to build upon.
It was a day above Avignon that he had an experience worth while. They were abreast of an old castle, nearing a village, one of the huddled jumble of houses of that locality, when, glancing over his left shoulder toward the distant mountain range, he received what he referred to later as a soul-stirring shock. Pointing to the outline of the distant range he said to the courier:
“Name it. Who is it?”
The courier said, “Napoleon.”
Clemens assented. The Admiral, when questioned, also promptly agreed that the mountain outlined was none other than the reclining figure of the great commander himself. They watched and discussed the phenomenon until they reached the village. Next morning Clemens was up for a first daybreak glimpse of his discovery. Later he reported it to Mrs. Clemens:
I did so long for you and Sue yesterday morning—the most superbsunrise—the most marvelous sunrise—& I saw it all, from the veryfaintest suspicion of the coming dawn, all the way through to thefinal explosion of glory. But it had an interest private to itself& not to be found elsewhere in the world; for between me & it, inthe far-distant eastward, was a silhouetted mountain range, in whichI had discovered, the previous afternoon, a most noble face upturnedto the sky, & mighty form outstretched, which I had named NapoleonDreaming of Universal Empire—& now this prodigious face, soft,rich, blue, spirituelle, asleep, tranquil, reposeful, lay againstthat giant conflagration of ruddy and golden splendors, all rayedlike a wheel with the up-streaming & far-reaching lances of the sun.It made one want to cry for delight, it was so supreme in itsunimaginable majesty & beauty.
He made a pencil-sketch of the Napoleon head in his note-book, and stated that the apparition could be seen opposite the castle of Beauchastel; but in later years his treacherous memory betrayed him, and, forgetting these identifying marks, he told of it as lying a few hours above Arles, and named it the “Lost Napoleon,” because those who set out to find it did not succeed. He even wrote an article upon the subject, in which he urged tourists to take steamer from Arles and make a short trip upstream, keeping watch on the right-hand bank, with the purpose of rediscovering the natural wonder. Fortunately this sketch was not published. It would have been set down as a practical joke by disappointed travelers. One of Mark Twain's friends, Mr. Theodore Stanton, made a persistent effort to find the Napoleon, but with the wrong directions naturally failed.
It required ten days to float to Arles. Then the current gave out and Clemens ended the excursion and returned to Lausanne by rail. He said:
“It was twenty-eight miles to Marseilles, and somebody would have to row. That would not have been pleasure; it would have meant work for the sailor, and I do not like work even when another person does it.”
To Twichell in America he wrote:
You ought to have been along—I could have made room for you easily,& you would have found that a pedestrian tour in Europe doesn'tbegin with a raft voyage for hilarity & mild adventure & intimatecontact with the unvisited native of the back settlements &extinction from the world and newspapers & a conscience in a stateof coma & lazy comfort & solid happiness. In fact, there's nothingthat's so lovely.
But it's all over. I gave the raft away yesterday at Arles & amloafing along back by short stages on the rail to Ouchy, Lausanne, wherethe tribe are staying at the Beau Rivage and are well and prosperous.
They had decided to spend the winter in Berlin, and in October Mrs. Clemens and Mrs. Crane, after some previous correspondence with an agent, went up to that city to engage an apartment. The elevator had not reached the European apartment in those days, and it was necessary, on Mrs. Clemens's account, to have a ground floor. The sisters searched a good while without success, and at last reached Kornerstrasse, a short, secluded street, highly recommended by the agent. The apartment they examined in Kornerstrasse was Number 7, and they were so much pleased with the conveniences and comfort of it and so tired that they did not notice closely its general social environment. The agent supplied an assortment of furniture for a consideration, and they were soon settled in the attractive, roomy place. Clemens and the children, arriving somewhat later, expressed themselves as satisfied.
Their contentment was somewhat premature. When they began to go out socially, which was very soon, and friends inquired as to their location, they noticed that the address produced a curious effect. Semi-acquaintances said, “Ah, yes, Kornerstrasse”; acquaintances said, “Dear me, do you like it?” An old friend exclaimed, “Good gracious! How in the world did you ever come to locate there?” Then they began to notice what they had not at first seen. Kornerstrasse was not disreputable, but it certainly was not elegant. There were rag warehouses across the street and women who leaned out the windows to gossip. The street itself was thronged with children. They played on a sand pile and were often noisy and seldom clean. It was eminently not the place for a distinguished man of letters. The family began to be sensitive on the subject of their address.
Clemens, of course, made humor out of it. He wrote a newspaper letter on the subject, a burlesque, naturally, which the family prevailed upon him not to print. But the humiliation is out of it now, and a bit of its humor may be preserved. He takes upon himself the renting of the place, and pictures the tour of inspection with the agent's assistant.
He was greatly moved when they came to the street and said, softly and lovingly:
“Ah, Korner Street, Korner Street, why did I not think of youbefore! A place fit for the gods, dear sir. Quiet?—notice howstill it is; and remember this is noonday—noonday. It is but oneblock long, you see, just a sweet, dear little nest hid away here inthe heart of the great metropolis, its presence and its sacred quietunsuspected by the restless crowds that swarm along the statelythoroughfares yonder at its two extremities. And——”“This building is handsome, but I don't think much of the others.They look pretty commonplace, compared with the rest of Berlin.”“Dear! dear! have you noticed that? It is just an affectation ofthe nobility. What they want——”“The nobility? Do they live in——”“In this street? That is good! very good, indeed! I wish the Dukeof Sassafras-Hagenstein could hear you say that. When the Dukefirst moved in here he——”“Does he live in this street?”“Him! Well, I should say so! Do you see the big, plain house overthere with the placard in the third floor window? That's hishouse.”“The placard that says 'Furnished rooms to let'? Does he keepboarders?”“What an idea! Him! With a rent-roll of twelve hundred thousandmarks a year? Oh, positively this is too good.”“Well, what does he have that sign up for?”The assistant took me by the buttonhole & said, with a merry lightbeaming in his eye:“Why, my dear sir, a person would know you are new to Berlin just byyour innocent questions. Our aristocracy, our old, real, genuinearistocracy, are full of the quaintest eccentricities,eccentricities inherited for centuries, eccentricities which theyare prouder of than they are of their titles, and that sign-boardthere is one of them. They all hang them out. And it's regulatedby an unwritten law. A baron is entitled to hang out two, a countfive, a duke fifteen——”“Then they are all dukes over on that side, I sup——”“Every one of them. Now the old Duke of Backofenhofenschwartz notthe present Duke, but the last but one, he——”“Does he live over the sausage-shop in the cellar?”“No, the one farther along, where the eighteenth yellow cat ischewing the door-mat——”“But all the yellow cats are chewing the door-mats.”“Yes, but I mean the eighteenth one. Count. No, never mind;there's a lot more come. I'll get you another mark. Let me see—-”
They could not remain permanently in Komerstrasse, but they stuck it out till the end of December—about two months. Then they made such settlement with the agent as they could—that is to say, they paid the rest of their year's rent—and established themselves in a handsome apartment at the Hotel Royal, Unter den Linden. There was no need to be ashamed of this address, for it was one of the best in Berlin.
As for Komerstrasse, it is cleaner now. It is still not aristocratic, but it is eminently respectable. There is a new post-office that takes in Number 7, where one may post mail and send telegrams and use the Fernsprecher—which is to say the telephone—and be politely treated by uniformed officials, who have all heard of Mark Twain, but have no knowledge of his former occupation of their premises.
Clemens, meantime, had been trying to establish himself in his work, but his rheumatism racked him occasionally and was always a menace. Closing a letter to Hall, he said:
“I must stop-my arm is howling.”
He put in a good deal of time devising publishing schemes, principal among them being a plan for various cheap editions of his books, pamphlets, and such like, to sell for a few cents. These projects appear never to have been really undertaken, Hall very likely fearing that a flood of cheap issues would interfere with the more important trade. It seemed dangerous to trifle with an apparently increasing prosperity, and Clemens was willing enough to agree with this view.
Clemens had still another letter to write for Laffan and McClure, and he made a pretty careful study of Berlin with that end in view. But his arm kept him from any regular work. He made notes, however. Once he wrote:
The first gospel of all monarchies should be Rebellion; the secondshould be Rebellion; and the third and all gospels, and the onlygospel of any monarchy, should be Rebellion—against Church andState.
And again:
I wrote a chapter on this language 13 years ago and tried my levelbest to improve it and simplify it for these people, and this is theresult—a word of thirty-nine letters. It merely concentrates thealphabet with a shovel. It hurts me to know that that chapter isnot in any of their text-books and they don't use it in theuniversity.
Socially, that winter in Berlin was eventful enough. William Walter Phelps, of New Jersey (Clemens had known him in America), was United States minister at the German capital, while at the Emperor's court there was a cousin, Frau von Versen, nee Clemens, one of the St. Louis family. She had married a young German officer who had risen to the rank of a full general. Mark Twain and his family were welcome guests at all the diplomatic events—often brilliant levees, gatherings of distinguished men and women from every circle of achievement. Labouchere of 'Truth' was there, De Blowitz of the 'Times', and authors, ambassadors, and scientists of rank. Clemens became immediately a distinguished figure at these assemblies. His popularity in Germany was openly manifested. At any gathering he was surrounded by a brilliant company, eager to do him honor. He was recognized whenever he appeared on the street, and saluted, though in his notes he says he was sometimes mistaken for the historian Mommsen, whom he resembled in hair and features. His books were displayed for sale everywhere, and a special cheap edition of them was issued at a few cents per copy.
Captain Bingham (later General Bingham, Commissioner of Police in New York City) and John Jackson were attaches of the legation, both of them popular with the public in general, and especially so with the Clemens family. Susy Clemens, writing to her father during a temporary absence, tells of a party at Mrs. Jackson's, and especially refers to Captain Bingham in the most complimentary terms.
“He never left me sitting alone, nor in an awkward situation of any kind, but always came cordially to the rescue. My gratitude toward him was absolutely limitless.”
She adds that Mrs. Bingham was very handsome and decidedly the most attractive lady present. Berlin was Susy's first real taste of society, and she was reveling in it. In her letter she refers to Minister Phelps by the rather disrespectful nickname of “Yaas,” a term conferred because of his pronunciation of that affirmative. The Clemens children were not entirely happy in the company of the minister. They were fond of him, but he was a great tease. They were quite young enough, but it seemed always to give him delight to make them appear much younger. In the letter above quoted Susy says:
When I saw Mr. Phelps I put out my hand enthusiastically and said,“Oh, Mr. Phelps, good evening,” whereat he drew back and said, soall could hear, “What, you here! why, you're too young. Do youthink you know how to behave?” As there were two or three younggentlemen near by to whom I hadn't been introduced I wasn't exactlyoverjoyed at this greeting.
We may imagine that the nickname “Yaas” had been invented by Susy in secret retaliation, though she was ready enough to forgive him, for he was kindness itself at heart.
In one of his later dictations Clemens related an anecdote concerning a dinner with Phelps, when he (Clemens) had been invited to meet Count S——, a cabinet minister of long and illustrious descent. Clemens, and Phelps too, it seems, felt overshadowed by this ancestry.
Of course I wanted to let out the fact that I had some ancestors,too; but I did not want to pull them out of their graves by theears, and I never could seem to get the chance to work them in, in away that would look sufficiently casual. I suppose Phelps was inthe same difficulty. In fact he looked distraught now and then justas a person looks who wants to uncover an ancestor purely byaccident and cannot think of a way that will seem accidental enough.But at last, after dinner, he made a try. He took us about hisdrawing-room, showing us the pictures, and finally stopped before arude and ancient engraving. It was a picture of the court thattried Charles I. There was a pyramid of judges in Puritan slouchhats, and below them three bareheaded secretaries seated at a table.Mr. Phelps put his finger upon one of the three and said, withexulting indifference:“An ancestor of mine.”I put a finger on a judge and retorted with scathing languidness:“Ancestor of mine. But it is a small matter. I have others.”
Clemens was sincerely fond of Phelps and spent a good deal of time at the legation headquarters. Sometimes he wrote there. An American journalist, Henry W. Fischer, remembers seeing him there several times scribbling on such scraps of paper as came handy, and recalls that on one occasion he delivered an address to a German and English audience on the “Awful German Tongue.” This was probably the lecture that brought Clemens to bed with pneumonia. With Mrs. Clemens he had been down to Ilsenburg, in the Hartz Mountains, for a week of change. It was pleasant there, and they would have remained longer but for the Berlin lecture engagement. As it was, they found Berlin very cold and the lecture-room crowded and hot. When the lecture was over they stopped at General von Versen's for a ball, arriving at home about two in the morning. Clemens awoke with a heavy cold and lung congestion. He remained in bed, a very sick man indeed, for the better part of a month. It was unpleasant enough at first, though he rather enjoyed the convalescent period. He could sit up in bed and read and receive occasional callers. Fischer brought him Memoirs of the Margravine of Bayreuth, always a favorite.—[Clemens was deeply interested in the Margravine, and at one time began a novel with her absorbing history as its theme. He gave it up, probably feeling that the romantic form could add nothing to the Margravine's own story.]—The Emperor sent Frau von Versen with an invitation for him to attend the consecration of some flags in the palace. When she returned, conveying thanks and excuses, his Majesty commanded her to prepare a dinner at her home for Mark Twain and himself and a few special guests, the date to be arranged when Clemens's physician should pronounce him well enough to attend.
Members of the Clemens household were impressed by this royal attention. Little Jean was especially awed. She said:
“I wish I could be in papa's clothes”; then, after reflection, “but that wouldn't be any use. I reckon the Emperor wouldn't recognize me.” And a little later, when she had been considering all the notables and nobilities of her father's recent association, she added:
“Why, papa, if it keeps on like this, pretty soon there won't be anybody for you to get acquainted with but God,” which Mark Twain decided was not quite as much of a compliment as it had at first seemed.
It was during the period of his convalescence that Clemens prepared his sixth letter for the New York Sun and McClure's syndicate, “The German Chicago,” a finely descriptive article on Berlin, and German customs and institutions generally. Perhaps the best part of it is where he describes the grand and prolonged celebration which had been given in honor of Professor Virchow's seventieth birthday.—[Rudolph Virchow, an eminent German pathologist and anthropologist and scholar; then one of the most prominent figures of the German Reichstag. He died in 1902.]—He tells how the demonstrations had continued in one form or another day after day, and merged at last into the seventieth birthday of Professor Helmholtz—[Herman von Helmholtz, an eminent German physicist, one of the most distinguished scientists of the nineteenth century. He died in 1894.]—also how these great affairs finally culminated in a mighty 'commers', or beer-fest, given in their honor by a thousand German students. This letter has been published in Mark Twain's “Complete Works,” and is well worth reading to-day. His place had been at the table of the two heroes of the occasion, Virchow and Helmholtz, a place where he could see and hear all that went on; and he was immensely impressed at the honor which Germany paid to her men of science. The climax came when Mommsen unexpectedly entered the room.—[Theodor Mommsen (1817-1903), an eminent German historian and archeologist, a powerful factor in all liberal movements. From 1874-1895 permanent secretary of the Berlin Royal Academy of Sciences.]
There seemed to be some signal whereby the students on the platformwere made aware that a professor had arrived at the remote door ofentrance, for you would see them suddenly rise to their feet, strikean erect military attitude, then draw their swords; the swords ofall their brethren standing guard at the innumerable tables wouldflash from the scabbard and be held aloft—a handsome spectacle.Three clear bugle-notes would ring out, then all these swords wouldcome down with a crash, twice repeated, on the tables and beuplifted and held aloft again; then in the distance you would seethe gay uniforms and uplifted swords of a guard of honor clearingthe way and conducting the guest down to his place. The songs werestirring, and the immense outpour from young life and young lungs,the crash of swords, and the thunder of the beer-mugs graduallyworked a body up to what seemed the last possible summit ofexcitement. It surely seemed to me that I had reached that summit,that I had reached my limit, and that there was no higher liftdevisable for me. When apparently the last eminent guest had longago taken his place, again those three bugle-blasts rang out, andonce more the swords leaped from their scabbards. Who might thislate comer be? Nobody was interested to inquire. Still, indolenteyes were turned toward the distant entrance, and we saw the silkengleam and the lifted sword of a guard of honor plowing through theremote crowds. Then we saw that end of the house rising to itsfeet; saw it rise abreast the advancing guard all along like a wave.This supreme honor had been offered to no one before. There was anexcited whisper at our table—“Mommsen!”—and the whole house rose—rose and shouted and stamped and clapped and banged the beer-mugs.Just simply a storm! Then the little man with his long hair andEmersonian face edged his way past us and took his seat. I couldhave touched him with my hand—Mommsen!—think of it!This was one of those immense surprises that can happen only a fewtimes in one's life. I was not dreaming of him; he was to me only agiant myth, a world-shadowing specter, not a reality. The surpriseof it all can be only comparable to a man's suddenly coming uponMont Blanc, with its awful form towering into the sky, when hedidn't suspect he was in its neighborhood. I would have walked agreat many miles to get a sight of him, and here he was, withouttrouble, or tramp, or cost of any kind. Here he was, clothed in atitanic deceptive modesty which made him look like other men. Herehe was, carrying the Roman world and all the Caesars in hishospitable skull, and doing it as easily as that other luminousvault, the skull of the universe, carries the Milky Way and theconstellations.
During his convalescent days, Clemens had plenty of time to reflect and to look out of the window. His notebook preserves some of his reflections. In one place he says: