The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1874-03-28

MARX TwAIN's TRIALS IN LoNDON.-The Lon
don Post prints as g. specimen of transatlantic
puffery - this happy hit by Mark Twain, at the
snobbish custom the English have of insisting
upon the presence of some person of rank at lee
lures or other popular gatherings, as a sort of
lay-igure to personify respectability =
Sir-NOw that my l%ecturing engagement is
drawing to it's close, l find that there is one at
traction which L forgot to provide, and that is
the attendance of some great member of the gov
ernment to give distinction to my entertainment.
Strictly speaking, | did not really forget this or
underrate its Importance, but the truth was, L
was afraid of it. l was afraid of it for the rea-
son that those great personages have SO many
calls upon their time that they cannot well spare
the time to sit out an entertainment, and L knew
that If one of them were to leave his box and re-
tire while l was lecturing it would seriously en-
barrass me-. | find, however, that many people
think 1 ought not to allow this lack to exist
longer therefore 1 feel compelled to reveal a
thing which / had intended to keep a secret. [
early. applied to a party in the East End, who
saud, and he agreed to lend me a couple of kings
and some nobility, and he said they would sit out
my lecture and not only sit it out, BUT that they
wouldn't even leave the place when it was done,
but would just stay where they were, perfectly
infatuated, and wait for more. So l made a bar
gain with him at once, and was going to ask the
newspapers to mention, in the usual column, that
on such an evening his majesty King Henry VIII.
would honor my entertainment with his presence,
and that on such and such an evening his majesty
William the Conqueror would be present, and
that on the succeeding evening Moses and Aaron
would be there, and so on. | felt encouraged
now an attendance like that would make my
entertainment all that could be desired, and be-
sides, l would not be embarrassed by their going
away before my lecture was over. But now mis-
fortune came. In attempting to move Henry
VIII. to my lecture hall the porter fell down
stairs and utterly smashed him all to pieces in
the course of moving William the Conqueror,
something let go and all the sawdust burst out of
him, and he collapsed and withered away to
nothing before my eyes. Then we collared some
dukes, but they were so -seedy and decayed that
nobody would ever have believed in their rank
and 80 1 gave them up, with almost a broken
heart. In my trouble l had nothing In the world
left to depend on now but just Moses and Aaron,
and l confess to you that it was all L could do to
keep the tears back when | came to examine
these two images and found that that man, in his
unapproachable ignorance, had been exhibiting
in Whitechapel for Moses and Aaron what any
educated person could see at a glance, by the
~ligature, were only the Siamese Twins. You see
now, sir, that l have done all that man could dc
to supply a complained-of lack, and if l failed |
think l ought to be pitied, not blamed. | wish
l could get a king somewhere, just only for a
little while, and | would take good care of him,
and send him home, and pay for the cab myself
MARX TWAIN.