The Tiffin tribune. (Tiffin, Ohio) 1868-1887, 1872-03-14
Getting on a Good Ready.

Mark Twain, at dinner given by
the proprietor Of the Aldile, the other
evening, to editors and literary people
/ in New York, was called on for 8
speech.
Mr.. Clemens Mark Twain said -
Gentlemen, would rather address
''stagn dinner party than any other
assem- blage in the world laughter,
for the reason that when you make
point, those who have been talking to
each other and did not hear it, applaud
louder than anybody else laughter,
and If I only had a speech prepared
for this occasion, I would take general
delight in delivering it [laughterl !.
But got the notification to be pres
ent this evening, at half past eleven
o'clock this morning, or pay what I
owed to the -AIdine establishment
LLaughterl; and I had to leave half an
hour after that in order to make the
trip, so l had no opportunity of pre-
pairing a speech, and am not one Of
those geniuses who can make a speech
tn7prOmptu. 1 have made a great
many happy impromptu speeches but
I had time to prepare them. laugh
teri. Now, it is singular, and L sup
HOoI AAAAF DAt AlA LA4G4ALGEcAlNN
which happened when I was fourteen
years of age, 1 might have rushed
blindly into real impromptu speeches,
and injured myself a good deal.
TLaughter1. This circumstance, which
happened when I was fourteen years
of age, has always protected me
against anything of that kind, and it
has led me to think q good deal-noW.
I don't think a good deal, generally
laughter, of what may probably be
the moving springs of human action.
I put that in merely because it is q
gO1d expression. LaUghterl. Imean,
il has led me to question in my own
mind, what may probably have been
the incidents in a mans life which
have remained with him longest;
whether they were important Incl
dents or whether they were merely
trivial ones. L have most comet the /
conclusion that the things that
stay longest by man, and shape his
action in after life, are really things /
Of trivial importance. Now the thing |
that made the deepest impression on |
my mind, and has lasted until this |
moment, was a matter in its elf essen |
tally trivial. It occurred when was |
a boy, and it has protected me up to |
this time, against making a speech |
when I hadn't a speech prepared It |
was q remark made by friend. He
said: 81 could have ketched them |
cats if / had on a good ready laugh |
ter Now at first glance, that don't |
appear to convey an idea, but it does, /
and the meat of it Is this; don't do |
hurriedly, don't do anything /
unless you are prepared to dOit, there
fore until this moment have never
made a speech unless l had that /
speech all set down and ready.
This incident is of no consequence
to you at all, and yet never made q
speech in my life unless I tried to in
culcate a moral [laughterl; unless /
tried to convey instruction, and il I
can make you better men than you
are rlaughterl-it is not for me to say
there is room for it, though suppose
there is llaughterl. If l can make
you wiser than you are, or If I can pro-
teet you in after life as I have been
protected, let me do it here, even if
perish on the spot laughter. Now,
this thing occurs in this wise. As
trivial as il is, il is q matter to be
- AIlF1AAAEAAf 4 NAAA4hH anu AEI4GLAGCLCls
When I was fourteen, as I remarked
before, l was living with my parents,
who were very poor, and correspond
ngly honest. We had q youth living
with us by the naEle of Jim Wolfe.
he was an excellent fellew, II yesTs
I'D, and very diffident. He and l |,
dept tOgether-virtuouslyl laughter =
md one very bitter winters night a
,Ousin Mary of mine-she's married
low and gone laughter l-gaYe what
hey called candy pulling; in those
lays, in the West, and they took the
aucers Of hot candy outside of the {
lOuse into the snow, under q sort of !
Id bower that came out from the !
aVes-it was a sort ofan ell then, all {
Overed with Yines-to cool this hot
andy in the snow, aud they were all Z
itting around there, and in the mean '
ime we were gone to bed; we Werei {
lot invited to attend this party, we !
7ere too youg. All these young &
aides and gentlemen assembled there y
nd Jim and / were in bed. There :
7as about four inches of snow on '
bis Ell, ,and our window looked out on a
0 it, and it was frozen hard.
A couple Of tom cats-it is possible v
ne might have been of the opposite G
ex Laughter were Assem- bled on the d
himney in the middle Of this ell, 0
nd they were growing at q fearful 4
are and switching their tails about n
No going on, and we couldn't sleep 4
ali. Finally Jim said, "FOr two d
q sngs y 10 go out and snake chem cats 2,
Il Ihat chimney" said, HOfcourse ii
on WOuld.D we'll ba said HTVaIT 7
, oJl1' -. IL, l nave mighty good notion
~ - sAys l, "Of course you have;
-l:--l :o-.lly you nave, you have q great ol
'ion u 70 Uo II" hoped he might try 2I
. DgI was afraid he wouldn't ss
Il-1-ily 4 t1 Ilu seb ms ambition I'D, and p1
e raised the WINDOW and climbed ont n
2 the ICY TOOL with nothing on but "
Is SOCKS ana very short shirt ss
IaughOer.I be went climbing along Il
all fours on the roof towards this n
where the cats were. IN S
le meantime these young ladies and "a
sntlemen were enjoying themselves in
1wn under the caves, and when Jim =
1t almost to that chimney he made
pass at the cats, and his heels few
? and he shot down and crashed =
trough those vines, and lit in the v
idst Of the ladies and gentlemen, and b
t down in those hot saueers of candy y
lughterl and there was q general a
Of course, and he came up q
airs dropping pieces of chinaware -
ID candy all the way up, and when &c
got up there-nOw, anybody In the en-
Orld would have gone into prOfani- -
or something calculated to relieve hs