"MARK TWAIN"—A CHARACTERISTIC POSE.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 7111, 25 April 1910, Page 8

"MARK TWAIN"—A CHARACTERISTIC POSE.

AMUSING STORIES. Some amusing excerpta from the autobiography of Mark Twain aro contained in the " North American Review." Mr Clemens, we are told, began to wnite his autobiography many years agio, and continues to apdd tc it day by day. He has written a quarter of a million words, but only portions of the work are to be published during his lifetime.

Mr UtomeiiG recounts tho circumstances of a welt-known, anecdote of the humorist. " Nine years ago," he says, " when we were living in Tedworth square, London, a report was cabled to *he American journals that I was dying, it was not the one. It was another Clemens, a cousin of mine— Dr J. Ross Clemens, now of St. Louis^—who was duo to die but presently escaped, by some chicanery or other characteristic of the tribe of Clemens. The London representatives of the American, papers began to flock in, with" American cables in their hands, to inquire into my condition. " There was' nothing the matter with me, and each in his turn was astonished, and disappointed, to find me reading and smoking in my study and worth next to nothing as a text for transatlantic news. One of thees men was a gentle and kindly and grave and . sympathetic Irishman, who hid his sorrow the best he could, and. tried to look glad, and told me that his paper, the ' Jivraing Sun,' had cabled him. that it was reported in New York that I was dead. AVhat should lie cable in reply? I said: ' Say the report is greatly exaggerated.' ,_ "He never 'smiled, but went solemnly away and sent the cable in those words. The remark hit the world pleasantly, and to this day it keeps turning up now and then in the newspapers when people have occasion to discount exaggerations. ' '' The next man was also an -Irishman. He had his New York cablegram in his hand—from the New York ' World '—and he was so evidently trying to get around that cable" with invented softnesses • and palliations that my curiosity was aroused, and 1wanted to see what it did really say. So when occasion offered I flipped 't out of his hand. It said: '"lf Mark Twain dying send 500 words. If dead send 1000.' " ANOTHER STORY.

Mr Andrew Ghat/to, who possessed the distinction of being Mark Twain's publisher, wrote to the former that the sleuth-hounds of the inooine tax were on his track. They wanted Mark to contribute to the support of the British Empire, and Mark Twain replied in a very humorous letter that the British Government had got into troublo before by demanding . taxes from America, and he did not wish to embroil two nations in a bitter war -again on the same subject. . • ■ Besides,, he said, he was acquainted with the Prince of Wafes, who doubtless remembered him, as once, while on top of a 'bus in the Strand, he passed the Prince at the head of a procession. . He exnressed the belief that the Prince would have little difficultv in remembering him, as lie was on the front seat of the 'bus, in a. grey overcoat with black' buttons. ' This letter was afterwards published in '! Harper's Monthly," and some years later, when Mark Twain arr rived at Hoihburg. he was introduced to the Prince of. Wales. "You haven't changed much, Mr Clemens,'' said the Prince. _ "Changed?" replied Twain, ; with surprise. " Why, you have never seen me before, sir?" "Oh, yes, don't vou remember ? You were on top of a 'bus in a grey coaf and I was at the head of a procession 1" ' » A PEN -PORTRAIT. A great many years ago there was a huge, rather Bohemian, party, held, in an enormous house in Fitzroy square, London. - • The house was the maAision in which Colonel - Newcome is said to. have lived: : the drawing-room in the days "of this' party was used as a studio: it was. very'high, panelled, lit with candles, and divided by folding doors. And this party was/attended by personages of European celebrity. There* were Wagner and Liszt - and Tourguenieff and Browning and Itossetti and Sir Frederick Leighton and Buxne-Jones and William Morris ain-d Bret Harte and—in the-' red -shirt, revolvers and top-boots of aNicaraguan filibuster—there was' Joaquim Miller. And, with a cigar held between his teeth, with a low collar leaving free a well-developed neck, with rather long hair that.bushily .suggested bunches.of grapes, with a thick moustache that had the lines of. being blown back by a wind, with keen- eyes veiled a little by: half-closed ..lids, as if they, too, were peering into a stiff breeze, silent,'observant, with the chin always pushed forward, there stood Mark Twain. It may'have been the unaccustomed society.that, rendered him so silent; it .'may have,been his compatriot's revolvers and red shirt glaring out among the :black velvet eonts and aesthetic-dresses; it may have been merely 'that it-was one of his silent days;"it-may have been that he simply could not "get the hana" of that assembly, , hut for hours he stood there in the candle-light and said nothing.

AN ADDEESS TO THE FILGBIMS. Tiler© are .two bands of Pilgrims. One foregathers in Now York, the other in London. Both have learned the art of entertaining right well. S» Boon as a distinguished American sets his foot on these shores (says a London contemporary of June 26th) he finds a. messenger awaiting him with a card of invitation for a feast, whereat he may learn in hie mother tongue all that the odd country may say in favour of him. Mnrk Twain could not escape the Pilgrims if he would. The luncheon was served in the Savoy Hotel.- The Eight Hon. Augustine Birrell, Chief Secretary for Ireland, presided over a company ol over 2XH) gentle-

The following is a portion of a characteristic speech of the great humourist: "X have alwaya had a good character. I have hardly ever stolen anything, and if I did. stoat anything I had discretion enough to know about the value of it first. I do not steal thangs that aire likely to get myself into trouble. I do not think any of us do that. I know ■we all take is to be expected; but, really, i have never taken anything, certainly in ■ England, that amounts to any great thirg. I do confess'that when I was here seven years, ago I stole a hat, but it didn't amount to anything. (Laughter.) It was not a good hat, and was only a clergyman's hat anyway. (Loud laughter.) I was at a luncheon party, and Archdeacon AVilberforce was there also. I daresay he is Archdeacon now—he wasia canon.then —and be was serving in the Westminster Battery, if that- is the proper term. (Laughter.) I do not know, as you mix military and ecclecia&tical things together so much. He left the luncheon table before I did. He began this thing. I did steal his hat, but he began by taking mine. I make that concession because I would not accuse Archdeacon Wilberforce of stealing my hat—l should not think of it. , (Laughter.) ■ I confine that phrase to myself. Ho merely took my hat. (Laughter.) And with gowl judgment, too; .it was a better hat than his. (Laughter.) He came out before the luncheon was. over, and sorted the hats in the hall, and selected one which suited. It happened to be mine. He went off with it. When I came out by-artd-bye there was no .hat there . which would go on my head except his, which was left behind. My he'ad was not' the customary size just at that , time. (Laughter.) 'l'had been receiving a good'' many very nice * and complimentary attentions,, and my head was a couplo of sizes. larger than usual, ' and his hat just suited me. The bumps and corners were all right intellectually. (Laughter.) There were results pleasing to me,- possibly so to him. He found out whoso hat it was, and wrote saying' it was pleasant that all,the way home; whenever/he met anybody, his gravities, his solemnities, deep thoughts,' his eloquent remarks were all snatched up by people he mot, and mistaken for briliiant humourisms. (Laughter.) I had another experience. It was not ■ unpleasing. I was received with a deference which w»8 r entirely foreign'to my experience, by everybody whom I met —(laughter)—so that before I got home I had-'a much higher opinion of myself than/1 have ever had before or since. And' there is- in that very connection am incident which I- remember at that old date w-hich is rather melancholy to me, because it sh.ow.show a person can deteriorate in a mere seven years. It is seven years ago. I have not that hat now. I was going: down Pall Mall; or some other of your big streets, and I recognised' that that hat needed ironing. I went into a big shop, and passed on my hat, and asked that it might, be; ironed.. They were courteouß, very courteous— : ©veh courtly. (Laughter.)' They,brought that hat back to me very sleek and nice, and I asked how much there was to pay. They replied thaA they did not charge the clergy anything. (Laughter.) I have cherished the deXight of that moment from that day to this. The' first thing I did the other'day was to. go ajnd hunt up' that shop and hand in;my bat to have it ironed. I' said. "How mnch?" when itcame back. - They' said "ninepence." (Laughter.) In seven years I have acquired all that worldlincss, and I am sorry to be back where I was; seven yeans ago. (Laughter.) But now lam chaffing and chaffing and chaffing here, and I hope you w-ill forgive me for that; but when a man stands on the verge of seventy-two you know perfectly well that he never reached that place without knowing what this life is—a heart-break-ing bereavement. , And so our reverence is for .our dead. Wo do not forget them, but our duty is towards the living, and if we can be cheerful, cheerful in spirit, .cheerful in speech and in hope, that is benefit to those who are around us. (Cheers.) My history includes an incident which •will' always connect mewith England in a . pathetic way, .for when I arrived here seven years sgo with my wife'and daughter we had gone around the globe lecturing to raise money to clear off a debt- My wife and one of my daughters started across the oceans to bring to England our eldest daughter. She was twenty-four years of age, and in'the bloom of womanhood, and we-were unsuspecting, when a cablegram—one of those heart-breaking, cablegrams which I we all in our days have to experience—was put into my hand. It stated that mv daughter had gone to her long sleep. And so, '-as I say, I. cannot always be cheerful, and I cannot always be chaffing; I must sometimes lay the cap.and bells aside. I have received since I have 'been here, in this one week, hundreds of letters from all conditions of people in. England—men. women, and children—and there is compliment, praise, and, atove all. and better than all. there is in them •• n note of affection. (Cheers.) Praise is . well, compliment is well,' but aff-ction—-that is the last and final and most pre'clous rownrd that, any .man.'can win, whether br ' character or achievement,, and "I am vcrv grateful to have that reward. .All- these letters make me feel that here in Encland. as in .America, when I stand, under the English flag, I am not a stranger. I am not'an alien, but at home. (Loud cheers).