Mark Twain's Speeches Part 11
The physicians think they are moved by regard for the best interests of the public. Isn't there a little touch of self-interest back of it all? It seems to me there is, and I don't claim to have all the virtues-only nine or ten of them.
I was born in the "Banner State," and by "Banner State" I mean Missouri. Osteopathy was born in the same State, and both of us are getting along reasonably well. At a time during my younger days my attention was attracted to a picture of a house which bore the inscription, "Christ Disputing with the Doctors."
I could attach no other meaning to it than that Christ was actually quarreling with the doctors. So I asked an old slave, who was a sort of a herb doctor in a small way-unlicensed, of course-what the meaning of the picture was. "What had has done?" I asked. And the colored man replied "Humph, he ain't got no license."
WATER-SUPPLY
Mr. Clemens visited Albany on February 21 and 28, 1901. The privileges of the floor were granted and he was asked to make a short address to the Senate.
MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN,-I do not know how to thank you sufficiently for this high honor which you are conferring upon me. I have for the second time now enjoyed this kind of prodigal hospitality-in the other House yesterday, to-day in this one. I am a modest man, and diffident about appearing before legislative bodies, and yet utterly an entirely appreciative of a courtesy like this when it is extended to me, and I thank you very much for it.
If I had the privilege, which unfortunately I have not got, of suggesting things to the legislators in my individual capacity, I would so enjoy the opportunity that I would not charge anything for it at all. I would do that without a salary. I would give them the benefit of my wisdom and experience in legislative bodies, and if I could have had the privilege for a few minutes of giving advice to the other House I should have liked to, but of course I could not undertake it, as they did not ask me to do it-but if they had only asked me!
Now that the House is considering a measure which is to furnish a water-supply to the city of New York, why, permit me to say I live in New York myself. I know all about its ways, its desires, and its residents, and-if I had the privilege-I should have urged them not to weary themselves over a measure like that to furnish water to the city of New York, for we never drink it.
But I will not venture to advise this body, as I only venture to advise bodies who are, not present.
MISTAKEN IDENt.i.tY
ADDRESS AT THE ANNUAL "LADIES' DAY," PAPYRUS CLUB, BOSTON
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,-I am perfectly astonished-a-s-t-o-n-i-s-h-e-d-ladies and gentlemen-astonished at the way history repeats itself. I find myself situated at this moment exactly and precisely as I was once before, years ago, to a jot, to a t.i.ttle-to a very hair. There isn't a shade of difference. It is the most astonishing coincidence that ever-but wait. I will tell you the former instance, and then you will see it for yourself. Years ago I arrived one day at Salamanca, New York, eastward bound; must change cars there and take the sleeper train. There were crowds of people there, and they were swarming into the long sleeper train and packing it full, and it was a perfect purgatory of dust and confusion and gritting of teeth and soft, sweet, and low profanity. I asked the young man in the ticket-office if I could have a sleeping-section, and he answered "No," with a snarl that shrivelled me up like burned leather. I went off, smarting under this insult to my dignity, and asked another local official, supplicatingly, if I couldn't have some poor little corner somewhere in a sleeping-car; but he cut me short with a venomous "No, you can't; every corner is full. Now, don't bother me any more"; and he turned his back and walked off. My dignity was in a state now which cannot be described. I was so ruffled that-"well," I said to my companion, "If these people knew who I am they-" But my companion cut me short there-"Don't talk such folly," he said; "if they did know who you are, do you suppose it would help your high-mightiness to a vacancy in a train which has no vacancies in it?"
This did not improve my condition any to speak of, but just then I observed that the colored porter of a sleeping-car had his eye on me. I saw his dark countenance light up. He whispered to the uniformed conductor, punctuating with nods and jerks toward me, and straightway this conductor came forward, oozing politeness from every pore.
"Can I be of any service to you?" he asked. "Will you have a place in the sleeper?"
"Yes," I said, "and much oblige me, too. Give me anything-anything will answer."
"We have nothing left but the big family state-room," he continued, "with two berths and a couple of arm-chairs in it, but it is entirely at your disposal. Here, Tom, take these satchels aboard!"
Then he touched his hat and we and the colored Tom moved along. I was bursting to drop just one little remark to my companion, but I held in and waited. Tom made us comfortable in that sumptuous great apartment, and then said, with many bows and a perfect affluence of smiles: "Now, is dey anything you want, sah? Case you kin have jes' anything you wants. It don't make no difference what it is."
"Can I have some hot water and a tumbler at nine to-night-blazing hot?" I asked. "You know about the right temperature for a hot Scotch punch?"
"Yes, sah, dat you kin; you kin pen on it; I'll get it myself."
"Good! Now, that lamp is hung too high. Can I have a big coach candle fixed up just at the head of my bed, so that I can read comfortably?"
"Yes, sah, you kin; I'll fix her up myself, an' I'll fix her so she'll burn all night. Yes, sah; an' you can jes' call for anything you want, and dish yer whole railroad'll be turned wrong end up an' inside out for to get it for you. Dat's so." And he disappeared.
Well, I tilted my head back, hooked my thumbs in my armholes, smiled a smile on my companion, and said, gently: "Well, what do you say now?"
My companion was not in the humor to respond, and didn't. The next moment that smiling black face was thrust in at the crack of the door, and this speech followed: "Laws bless you, sah, I knowed you in a minute. I told de conductah so. Laws! I knowed you de minute I sot eyes on you."
"Is that so, my boy?" (Handing him a quadruple fee.) "Who am I?"
"Jenuel McClellan," and he disappeared again.
My companion said, vinegarishly, "Well, well! what do you say now?" Right there comes in the marvellous coincidence I mentioned a while ago-viz., I was speechless, and that is my condition now. Perceive it?
CATS AND CANDY
The following address was delivered at a social meeting of literary men in New York in 1874: When I was fourteen I was living with my parents, who were very poor-and correspondently honest. We had a youth living with us by the name of Jim Wolfe. He was an excellent fellow, seventeen years old, and very diffident. He and I slept together-virtuously; and one bitter winter's night a cousin Mary-she's married now and gone-gave what they call a candy-pulling in those days in the West, and they took the saucers of hot candy outside of the house into the snow, under a sort of old bower that came from the eaves-it was a sort of an ell then, all covered with vines-to cool this hot candy in the snow, and they were all sitting there. In the mean time we were gone to bed. We were not invited to attend this party; we were too young.
The young ladies and gentlemen were a.s.sembled there, and Jim and I were in bed. There was about four inches of snow on the roof of this ell, and our windows looked out on it; and it was frozen hard. A couple of tom-cats-it is possible one might have been of the opposite s.e.x-were a.s.sembled on the chimney in the middle of this ell, and they were growling at a fearful rate, and switching their tails about and going on, and we couldn't sleep at all.
Finally Jim said, "For two cents I'd go out and snake them cats off that chimney." So I said, "Of course you would." He said, "Well, I would; I have a mighty good notion to do it." Says I, "Of course you have; certainly you have, you have a great notion to do it." I hoped he might try it, but I was afraid he wouldn't.
Finally I did get his ambition up, and he raised the window and climbed out on the icy roof, with nothing on but his socks and a very short shirt. He went climbing along on all fours on the roof toward the chimney where the cats were. In the mean time these young ladies and gentlemen were enjoying themselves down under the eaves, and when Jim got almost to that chimney he made a pa.s.s at the cats, and his heels flew up and he shot down and crashed through those vines, and lit in the midst of the ladies and gentlemen, and sat down in those hot saucers of candy.
There was a stampede, of course, and he came up-stairs dropping pieces of chinaware and candy all the way up, and when he got up there-now anybody in the world would have gone into profanity or something calculated to relieve the mind, but he didn't; he sc.r.a.ped the candy off his legs, nursed his blisters a little, and said, "I could have ketched them cats if I had had on a good ready."
[Does any reader know what a "ready" was in 1840? D.W.]
OBITUARY POETRY
ADDRESS AT THE ACTORS' FUND FAIR, PHILADELPHIA, in 1895 LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,-The-er this-er-welcome occasion gives me an-er-opportunity to make an-er-explanation that I have long desired to deliver myself of. I rise to the highest honors before a Philadelphia audience. In the course of my checkered career I have, on divers occasions, been charged-er-maliciously with a more or less serious offence. It is in reply to one of the more-er-important of these that I wish to speak. More than once I have been accused of writing obituary poetry in the Philadelphia Ledger.
I wish right here to deny that dreadful a.s.sertion. I will admit that once, when a compositor in the Ledger establishment, I did set up some of that poetry, but for a worse offence than that no indictment can be found against me. I did not write that poetry-at least, not all of it.
CIGARS AND TOBACCO
My friends for some years now have remarked that I am an inveterate consumer of tobacco. That is true, but my habits with regard to tobacco have changed. I have no doubt that you will say, when I have explained to you what my present purpose is, that my taste has deteriorated, but I do not so regard it.
Whenever I held a smoking-party at my house, I found that my guests had always just taken the pledge.
Let me tell you briefly the history of my personal relation to tobacco. It began, I think, when I was a lad, and took the form of a quid, which I became expert in tucking under my tongue. Afterward I learned the delights of the pipe, and I suppose there was no other youngster of my age who could more deftly cut plug tobacco so as to make it available for pipe-smoking.
Well, time ran on, and there came a time when I was able to gratify one of my youthful ambitions-I could buy the choicest Havana cigars without seriously interfering with my income. I smoked a good many, changing off from the Havana cigars to the pipe in the course of a day's smoking.
At last it occurred to me that something was lacking in the Havana cigar. It did not quite fulfil my youthful antic.i.p.ations. I experimented. I bought what was called a seed-leaf cigar with a Connecticut wrapper. After a while I became satiated of these, and I searched for something else, The Pittsburg stogy was recommended to me. It certainly had the merit of cheapness, if that be a merit in tobacco, and I experimented with the stogy.
Then, once more, I changed off, so that I might acquire the subtler flavor of the Wheeling toby. Now that palled, and I looked around New York in the hope of finding cigars which would seem to most people vile, but which, I am sure, would be ambrosial to me. I couldn't find any. They put into my hands some of those little things that cost ten cents a box, but they are a delusion.
I said to a friend, "I want to know if you can direct me to an honest tobacco merchant who will tell me what is the worst cigar in the New York market, excepting those made for Chinese consumption-I want real tobacco. If you will do this and I find the man is as good as his word, I will guarantee him a regular market for a fair amount of his cigars."
We found a tobacco dealer who would tell the truth-who, if a cigar was bad, would boldly say so. He produced what he called the very worst cigars he had ever had in his shop. He let me experiment with one then and there. The test was satisfactory.
This was, after all, the real thing. I negotiated for a box of them and took them away with me, so that I might be sure of having them handy when I want them.
I discovered that the "worst cigars," so called, are the best for me, after all.
BILLIARDS
Mr. Clemens attended a billiard tourney on the evening of April 24, 1906, and was called on to tell a story.
The game of billiards has destroyed my naturally sweet disposition. Once, when I was an underpaid reporter in Virginia City, whenever I wished to play billiards I went out to look for an easy mark. One day a stranger came to town and opened a billiard parlor. I looked him over casually. When he proposed a game, I answered, "All right."
"Just knock the b.a.l.l.s around a little so that I can get your gait," he said; and when I had done so, he remarked: "I will be perfectly fair with you. I'll play you left-handed." I felt hurt, for he was cross-eyed, freckled, and had red hair, and I determined to teach him a lesson. He won first shot, ran out, took my half-dollar, and all I got was the opportunity to chalk my cue.
"If you can play like that with your left hand," I said, "I'd like to see you play with your right."
"I can't," he said. "I'm left-handed."
THE UNION RIGHT OR WRONG
REMINISCENCES OF NEVADA I can a.s.sure you, ladies and gentlemen, that Nevada had lively newspapers in those days.
My great compet.i.tor among the reporters was Boggs, of the Union, an excellent reporter.
Once in three or four months he would get a little intoxicated; but, as a general thing, he was a wary and cautious drinker, although always ready to damp himself a little with the enemy.
He had the advantage of me in one thing: he could get the monthly public-school report and I could not, because the princ.i.p.al hated my sheet-the 'Enterprise'.
One snowy night, when the report was due, I started out, sadly wondering how I was to get it.
Presently, a few steps up the almost deserted street, I stumbled on Boggs, and asked him where he was going.
"After the school report."
"I'll go along with you."
"No, Sir. I'll excuse you."
"Have it your own way."