A MANY-COLOURED CAREER.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 799, 23 April 1910, Page 6

A MANY-COLOURED CAREER.

HUMOURIST, NOVELIST, SiTEB OF : SHAMS. Samnel Langhorno Clemens (Mark Twain) was born on November SO,- 1835, at Florida, Missouri. His father removed to Hannibal soon after tho birth of this son to take up a position of county judge. When young Clemens was only 12 years old his father died, and the lad had to got liis edu. cation as best he

could. Hark Twain was not. educated for a literary career, nor was he passed through the curriculum of the colleges. He graduated iu the university of tho world, in; which hoenteredasai'reshiuan. His liighsehool was the village printing-office, conducted by his elder! ■brother, and then'he went to a Mississippi steamboat, and afterwards to the silver mines of Nevada. These were his class-rooms, and it may be 'a good tiling ■ for litoraturo_ that Mark v Twain was ■ never ground into smooth uniformity under the scholastic em-ery-wheel. He made his first .'mark, as ii descriptive writer as a special correspondent in the Sandwich Isles, and achieved fame in the humorous' description of the Old World :as seen by the. most modern of children of the Newest West.. Few men had. moro ups and clowns than Mark Twain, who experienced almost every extreme of good and ill fortnne. He was com-

monly regarded as a humonsi only, and : no doubt lie was a humorist of remarkable comic force and refreshing fertility; but beneath,his fun-making can be discerned a man with a vein of seriousness, and whose ethical standards were ever lofty. His works show a deep 6corn of all sorts of sham' and pretence,'and a hatred of humbug and hypocrisy.

, Early Days. Prom his earliest ..childhood Mark' Twain was of an adventurous nature, and before he was 13 had been extracted from the Mississippi and Bear Creek on no fewer than nine occasions, and. his mother, with a confidence in his' future, which never deserted her, merely remarked: "People .who are born to be hanged are safe -in the water." ■ By. 1853,.. the youthful Clemens, who had learned to eet type, disappeared from home ~a"nd wandered from one Eastern printing-office,jo another. Hβ Baw the ■iWorlde Pair..at. 1 -New".yprk and other marvels, supporting himself by setting qrpe. Financial 6tress ' eventually drove him back to his family, and he lived at &t. Louis, Muscatine.and Keokuk until' IBS!, when he was initiated into • the mysteries; of steamboat piloting: The charm of this warm .indolent existence coloured Jus whole subsequent life. In "Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn," "Life on the Mississippi," and "Pudd'nhead Wilson," every phase of that vanished estate is lovingly dealt with.' Young Clemens went through all the hard training of the pilot, stored away in his head the bewildering mass of information and the duties required, and received the license that-wae the diploma of the river university, and entered into regular employment. Ho regarded himself as established lor life .when-the.outbreak of the Civil War wiped out his'occupation at a stroke, and made Eia weary apprenticeship a' useless labour. Clemens was in New Orleans when Louisiana seceded and started North-the .next day. Theboatran a blockade.every day of her trip, and on the last night of the .voyage the batteries at Jefferson Barracks, just below St. Louis, fired two shots through her' fun; nels. ■ Brought up in a slave-holding community, Mark Twain naturally sym-1 pathised at first with the South. In June he joined the Confederates in' Balls County, Missouri; as a second lieutenant .under General Tom Harris. His military career lasted for two weeks. Narrowly missing the distinction of being captured' by Colonel Grant, he resigned, explaining that he had become "incapacitated by fatigue" through persistent retreating.

Journalism and Duelling. .Subsequently Clemens started West with his brother, who had just bee-n appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Nevada. A year of variegated fortune-hunting among the silver mines followed. He wrote, occasional letters during- this time to tho leading newspaper of the Territory, the "Virginia City. Territorial Enterprise," and • these attracted the attention of the proprietor, who offered Mark Twain the position of local editor on his staff. His work created a sensation, and this encouraged him to give his letters more individuality by sighing them. For this purpose he adopted the old Mississippi leadman's call i for two fathoms, "Mark Twain." At that-period duelling was a passing fashion on the- Comstock. The refinements of. Parisian civilisation had not penetrated there, and a Washoe duel seldom left more than- one survivor.: The weapons were always Colt's navy revolvers, distance 15 paces, fire, and advance; six shots allowed. Mark Twain became involved in a quarrel with the editor of the Virginia "TTnion," and the sifaation seemed to call for a duel. Neither combatant was expert with the pistol, but. Twain was fortunate in having a second . who. was. The men were practising in adjacent gorges, both performing moderately. A small bird lit on a. bush 30 yards away, and Twain's second fired and knocked oft its head. At that moment the enemy came over the ridge, saw the dead bird, and was informed by the humorist's second that, the feat had been performed by Mark. Twain, for' whom such an • exploit was nothing '•■remarkable. The foes withdrew fori consultation, and then offered a formal, apology, after which .peace was restored, leaving Mark Twain with tho honour of war. This incident was the means of effecting another change in his life. There was a new. law. .which. prescribed two years' imprisonment for any one who should send, carry, or accept a challenge. The fame of the proposed duel had reached the capital. 18 miles away, and the Governor gave orders for the arrest of all concerned, announcing his intention of making an exnmplo of them. A ..friend of the duellists outrode the officers of the law, and 'hurried the parties over the border into California., Mark Twain found a berth as city editor of the San Francisco "Morning Call," but ho was not adapted for' routino newspaper work, and in a couple of years ho made another bid for fortune at the mines. In three months he was back ai San Francisco penniless, .lnrt in the line of literary promotion. Ho wrote for the "Virginia Enterprise" for a time, but, tiring of that, started on a visit to Hawaii for the Sacramento "Union" to. write up tho sugar interests. In Honolulu he .accomplished one of his greatest feats of "straight newspaper work," writing all day and all night on the story of the skeleton survivors of the dipper Hornet, which had ieen bnrnsd at- sea. Tie survivors reach-

Ed the island after 43 days in an- open boat, and Twain gathered their storiee and gave" a complete account of the horror aboard a schooner that had already cast off. .This was the only full account of the occurrence that reached California, and ■ was not only a "scoop" of unusual magnitude, but an 'admirable piece of literary art. The " Union" paid its correspondent ten times the usual rate .for it. After sis months in the islands, Mark Twain returned to California, and made his first venture iipon the lectureplatform with success. ■

The Innocents Abroad! In ISB7 he went East, and joined the Quaker City excursion to Europe and the i Holy Land, as correspondent of the "Alta « California" of San Francisco. During ■~ the tour : the party, visited the Mediter-"' ranean and• the Black-Sea.- From•'•'• this ' trip ! grew, "The .Innocents, Abroad,"; the ■■.•■. creator, of Twain's reputation as a lite- . rary. force of the first brder. "The eel*: brated Jumping. Prog'of Calaveras Coun-■'" : had preceded this work, but "Th» Innocents" gave'• the author' his first introduction to international literature,*': Four years of'lecturing followed. Twain was married in 1870,' and his first home", as a married man was in Buffalo, where ho had taken a third interest in a daily V paper, the "Buffalo Express." This wae

hie last attempt at regular newspanefwork, and a year of it proved enongn. Hβ had become assured of a market fa • anything he might produce, and he could choose his own place and time of writing. The Clemens family . moved to Hartford in- 1871, and the years that.followed brought a steady literary development "Boughing It," which was written, ■■"•■ in 1572, scored a success hardly second is "The Innocents.". "The Gilded Age" was. .-, produced the same year, and "Tom Sawyer" appeared in 1876, but it wae.not .-. until nine.years later that "Huckleberry ■ " Finn" was published ..as..- a sequel to "Tom Sawyer." Other well-known works v . followed, such as "The Princess and the Pauper," "A Connecticut Yankee at King•.; Arthur's Court," "Pudd'nhead Wilson, • : "Personal Recollections of Joan of Aio," "Life on the Mississippi," and "A Tramp' Abroad." fortune had been favourable. ' to the writer, who had been spoken of by the press, sometimes with , admiration, as '■ an 'eiampkrof "financial-eucoesSlp«(- a "*< eible in literature, ■■ and sometimes with. ' uncharitable envy, as a millHmaire, foi-getful «f his humble friend*. ■ ■ Unfortunate Investments.;' ,;.*.,:■..

-A eeriea of unfortunate investment! came, however, and'swept away de savings of half a lifetime, leaving the author, loaded with debts. He financed a pub-, lishing house in 1885, and the business started out. remarkably well. He was alra spending groat sums of money on a Betting machine, but after sinking' a fortune in it between 1886 and 1889, had to write off the whole investment as a dead loss, as the machine was too complicated and expensive for commercial use. On top of this, the publishing house;, which had been supposed to be doing a good business, turned out to have been incapably.'conducted, and all the money that came into its hands was lost When the house failed. Mark Twain found tthat it had not only absorbed all he had put in, but had incurred liabilities of 96,009 dollars, of : "which less than one-third, waa covered by ' assets. Legal liability for Ihe debts could have been avoided,' but as tho credit of the company had been largely based on his name, Mark Twain. ; felt bound in honour to pay them. Thus. in 1595-6 he took his wife and second .laughter' on a lecturing tour round the • ■world, wrote "Following the Equator,*, ind eventually cleared off the obligations (if the house in full.

Notable amongst his later works is hi book against Christian Science. His r«;ent cordial reception in England, and his white mrit, are, still fresh in memory Tα 1907 he was a recipient of the honoraa degree of Litt. D. at Oxford.

Family Life. ". In his domestic life Mart Twain- waa ' almost ideally fortunate. ' : '■ In 1868, when a newly-inarried friend was asking him why he did not begin tb' think of marrying, he replied with deep feeling: ' ' .'■' . "I am taking thought of it I am in. love beyond 'all telling with the dearest: and best girl-in the whole work. I don't suppose she will marry me. I can't-, think it possible. She ought not to. • But if she doesn't I shall, always be sure that the best thing I ever did was,to fall in love with her, and proud to have it" known that I tried to win her!"

Mr. Twiehell says: "Two years afterwards the lady of whom he spoke becamo his wife. Prom their wedding day he has never-ceased to be the lover revealed in that confession and humble declaration, as everyone who has been observant of him , under his own roof will bear witness. His wife's companionship is his perpetual supreme ■ felicity, absence from her his suDreme discomfort. He is eminently.fond of abiding at home.. His fireside is ever, his peculiar delight. Nothing gives him more pleasure than to arrange and take part in simple domestic 'festivities and entertainments, tableaux, charades, \etc—for which he. has the happiest talent." Mrs. Clemens died in 1904: Of 'the four children of their*happy marriage only two were surviving last year—his daughters Clara (who married M. Gabrilovitsch, Russian pianist), and Jean. Then, on December' 24 last, came a blow which coloured Mark Twain's last Christ-' mas with tragedy. Miss Jean Clemens, who figures as the author of many humorous remarks, recorded, in. her. father's autobiography—was..-found dead in her bath, with tho'water still running, many, inches over her head. , She had been sub-' ject to epileptic 1 fits, but latterly had appeared to be quite cured. A recurrence of the seizuro had, caused her death.

Mark Twain was the last of the household to be informed of the tragedy, the ehock.vof-'which overcame him. "Jean, ,, heisaid;,"has been.leading a very active Jifo recently..; She ; spent the greater pad of her-time-..looking after, a farm Thought her, and', did much of my-secretarial work besides. Last she and I were chat, tering later' than"''usual .in the.library. She told me her, plans for; housekeeping for. sho was also, ray housekeeper.'"Wβ arranged to'go l.b?i.4her to Bermuda in "February:. Now she is gone, poof child. She was all I had left except my daughter Clara." .:" : : ...

He went to Bermuda to see if the change would relieve tho shock and benefit his health. The sequel is in , to-day*e cablegram. . ;