Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1876-03-23
.MFSCEEE.F.VEOUS.
MARK TWAIN'S BOYHOOD.
How Sam Clemens and Pole
Pavey Puzzled the OrnifhOiO-
pTS1S

HOW sam clemens and FOIe
Pavey Puzzled the OrnifhOiO.
gfstS.
Hannibal NIo.) Courier
Au article recently published in the
Courier brought up in party of gen.
tleman, two of whom were Messrs. Da-
vid Dean and William Brown, of Rails
county, a conversation in regard to the
early youth of Sam Clemens, Mark
Twain.
Several very amusing anecdotes were
related about Mark when he was a
small boy, among others the following:
Mark had constant playmate and a
chum, boy about his own age, named
Napoleon Pavey, or, for short, Pole
Pavey. Ole warm, spring day, the
two boys having got holiday, Mark
shouldered an old fIint-l0ck musket,
and Pole an old squirrel rifle without
any lOcE at eil, which he carried along,
rs he said, inst for the looks of the
thing, and went duck hunting over in
Shy bottom. The boys hunted faith
fully for several hours and succeeded
in killiDg --itken-hawk and a crow,
after Wai.a JAey commenced their
homewarl lrch, not very proud of
their suo is il this region at that
day gam 3o1nded.
Final. lark stopped suddenly, as
an idea aim, and exclaimed:
''See Pole, let's get up a rare
- VIII call it? a rare geologi-
cal speci ar the boss; you see he's
got Ainkerin' after these
things"
"Whst' rare geological specimen,
Mark? SAID Pole, as he opened wide his
eyes.
"Why, It's rare bird what amt
never been seen in these parts before;
something very uncommon-like," an
swered Marx.
"Whera are you going to git her at,
Malk? We AMT got nothing but this
old chicken-rObber and egg-sucker, and
they amt a bit uncommon" queried
the skeptical Pole.
wen git her up TO order, Pole,' an-
swered Mark, as he flung himself on
the green grass beneath giant old
elm tree.
The two boys vent to work on their
rare geological specimen. As Mark
would pluck feather from the tail of
the crow, Pole would hand him a cor
responding feather that had been taken
from the tail of the hawk, which Mark
would carefully insert in the socket
from which he had just pulled the
crows feather. And thus, after two
hours Of steady work, every one of the
long feathers OF the hawks tail had
been transferred to the crow, and it
would have required a careful exami-
nation to have detected the fraud.
'lIOw is that for a specimen, Pole %
said Mark, as he admiringly exhibited
the retailed crow to the gaze of his
companion, resplendent in the rich
plumage Of the chicken eater.
SHE is sumner, Mark; regular
sumner. 1 guess they amt never seen
bird like that in Hannibal before
The hawk was thrown away, and the
boys trudged homeward. By the time
they arrived in town the blood of the |
crow had CONCEALED, and the false feath-
er5 in the tail had become firmly fixed. |
AS Mark had said, Judge Clemens,
his father, was somewhat of natural
ist, and had passion for whatever was
rare and strange in the animal king
dom.
why, Mark p he said, where in the
world did you getthat strange looking
bird p
It's my opinion replied Mark, with
an air of greater importance than he
was accustomed to assume in the pres
ence of his father, that is the Bird of
Paradise; leastwise that it belongs to
that Species
That night the bird was carefully
laid away in place where it We uld bel
safe from the devOuring presence of the
old tom-cats, which Mark afterwards !,
wrote about creating such fearful de-l1