Complete Letters of Mark Twain. Mark Twain

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СКАЧАТЬ the “Comet,” which left Honolulu several hours before we did. She is about twelve miles away, and so we cannot see her hull, but the sailors think it is the Comet because of some peculiarity about her fore-top-gallant sails. We have watched her all the forenoon.

      Afternoon We had preaching on the quarter-deck by Rev. Mr. Rising, of Virginia City, old friend of mine. Spread a flag on the booby-hatch, which made a very good pulpit, and then ranged the chairs on either side against the bulwarks; last Sunday we had the shadow of the mainsail, but today we were on the opposite tack, close hauled, and had the sun. I am leader of the choir on this ship, and a sorry lead it is. I hope they will have a better opinion of our music in Heaven than I have down here. If they don’t a thunderbolt will come down and knock the vessel endways.

      The other ship is the Comet – she is right abreast three miles away, sailing on our course – both of us in a dead calm. With the glasses we can see what we take to be men and women on her decks. I am well acquainted with nearly all her passengers, and being so close seems right sociable.

      Monday 7—I had just gone to bed a little after midnight when the 2d mate came and roused up the captain and said “The Comet has come round and is standing away on the other tack.” I went up immediately, and so did all our passengers, without waiting to dress-men, women and children. There was a perceptible breeze. Pretty soon the other ship swept down upon us with all her sails set, and made a fine show in the luminous starlight. She passed within a hundred yards of us, so we could faintly see persons on her decks. We had two minutes’ chat with each other, through the medium of hoarse shouting, and then she bore away to windward.

      In the morning she was only a little black peg standing out of the glassy sea in the distant horizon – an almost invisible Mark.in the bright sky. Dead calm. So the ships have stood, all day long – have not moved 100 yards.

      Aug. 8—The calm continues. Magnificent weather. The gentlemen have all turned boys. They play boyish games on the poop and quarter-deck. For instance: They lay a knife on the fife-rail of the mainmast – stand off three steps, shut one eye, walk up and strike at it with the fore-finger; (seldom hit it;) also they lay a knife on the deck and walk seven or eight steps with eyes close shut, and try to find it. They kneel – place elbows against knees – extend hands in front along the deck – place knife against end of fingers – then clasp hands behind back and bend forward and try to pick up the knife with their teeth and rise up from knees without rolling over or losing their balance. They tie a string to the shrouds – stand with back against it walk three steps (eyes shut) – turn around three times and go and put finger on the string; only a military man can do it. If you want to know how perfectly ridiculous a grown man looks performing such absurdities in the presence of ladies, get one to try it.

      Afternoon – The calm is no more. There are three vessels in sight. It is so sociable to have them hovering about us on this broad waste of water. It is sunny and pleasant, but blowing hard. Every rag about the ship is spread to the breeze and she is speeding over the sea like a bird. There is a large brig right astern of us with all her canvas set and chasing us at her best. She came up fast while the winds were light, but now it is hard to tell whether she gains or not. We can see the people on the forecastle with the glass. The race is exciting. I am sorry to know that we shall soon have to quit the vessel and go ashore if she keeps up this speed.

      Friday, Aug. 10—We have breezes and calms alternately. The brig is two miles to three astern, and just stays there. We sail directly east – this brings the brig, with all her canvas set, almost in the eye of the sun, when it sets – beautiful. She looks sharply cut and black as a coal, against a background of fire and in the midst of a sea of blood.

      San Francisco, Aug. 20.—We never saw the Comet again till the 13th, in the morning, three miles away. At three o’clock that afternoon, 25 days out from Honolulu, both ships entered the Golden Gate of San Francisco side by side, and 300 yards apart. There was a gale blowing, and both vessels clapped on every stitch of canvas and swept up through the channel and past the fortresses at a magnificent gait.

      I have been up to Sacramento and squared accounts with the Union. They paid me a great deal more than they promised me.

      Yrs aff,

      Sam.

      VI. Letters 1866-67. The Lecturer. Success On The Coast. In New York. The Great Ocean Excursion

      It was August 13th when he reached San Francisco and wrote in his note-book, “Home again. No – not home again – in prison again, and all the wild sense of freedom gone. City seems so cramped and so dreary with toil and care and business anxieties. God help me, I wish I were at sea again!”

      The transition from the dreamland of a becalmed sailing-vessel to the dull, cheerless realities of his old life, and the uncertainties of his future, depressed him – filled him with forebodings. At one moment he felt himself on the verge of suicide – the world seemed so little worth while.

      He wished to make a trip around the world, a project that required money. He contemplated making a book of his island letters and experiences, and the acceptance by Harper’s Magazine of the revised version of the Hornet Shipwreck story encouraged this thought.

      Friends urged him to embody in a lecture the picturesque aspect of Hawaiian life. The thought frightened him, but it also appealed to him strongly. He believed he could entertain an audience, once he got started on the right track. As Governor of the Third House at Carson City he had kept the audience in hand. Men in whom he had the utmost confidence insisted that he follow up the lecture idea and engage the largest house in the city for his purpose. The possibility of failure appalled him, but he finally agreed to the plan.

      In Roughing It, and elsewhere, has been told the story of this venture – the tale of its splendid success. He was no longer concerned, now, as to his immediate future. The lecture field was profitable. His audience laughed and shouted. He was learning the flavor of real success and exulting in it. With Dennis McCarthy, formerly one of the partners in the Enterprise, as manager, he made a tour of California and Nevada.

      To Mrs. Jane Clemens and others, in St. Louis:

      Virginia city, Nov. 1, 1866.

      All the folks, affectionate greeting, – You know the flush time’s are past, and it has long been impossible to more than half fill the Theatre here, with any sort of attraction, but they filled it for me, night before last – full – dollar all over the house.

      I was mighty dubious about Carson, but the enclosed call and some telegrams set that all right – I lecture there tomorrow night.

      They offer a full house and no expense in Dayton – go there next. Sandy Baldwin says I have made the most sweeping success of any man he knows of.

      I have lectured in San Francisco, Sacramento, Marysville, Grass Valley, Nevada, You Bet, Red Dog and Virginia. I am going to talk in Carson, Gold Hill, Silver City, Dayton, Washoe, San Francisco again, and again here if I have time to re-hash the lecture.

      Then I am bound for New York – lecture on the Steamer, maybe.

      I’ll leave toward 1st December – but I’ll telegraph you.

      Love to all.

      Yrs.

      Mark.

      His lecture tour continued from October until December, a period of picturesque incident, the story of which has been recorded elsewhere. – [See Mark Twain: A Biography, by the same author] – It paid him well; he could go home now, without shame. Indeed, from his next letter, full of the boyish elation which always to his last years was the complement of his success, СКАЧАТЬ