Evening star., 1881-12-28
MARK TWAIN ON THE p,vcD,,,s



The Philadelphia Press saws that when Mr.
oanuel L. Clemens was called upon at the din
ner OF the Sons Of New England in that CITY on
thursday evening, he arose. and in a pecnliar
sleepy manner began his remarks by thanking
the company for the deserved compliment to
himself and to his posterity. II shall continue
10 do my best" drawled out the speaker. and he
continued as follows:
Il rise to protest. have kept still for years,
put really think there is no sufficient ustifica-
ton for this sort of thing What do you want
10 celebrate those people fOr?-thOse ancestors
OF yours, of 1620-the Mayflower tribe, l mean.
"nat do you want to celebrate them for? Your
pardon: the gentleman at my left assures me
That You are not celebrating the pilgrims them
selves. but the landing of the pilgrims at Ply
mouth Rock on the 22d of December SOyou are
celebrating their landing. Why. the other preteXt
was thin enough but this is thinner than ever: the
other was tissue. tinfol, fishbladder but this is
gold leaf. Celebrating their landing. What was
there remarkable about it. | would like to
know? What can yOu be thinking of? Why
those pilgrims had been at sea three or four
months. 1t was the very middle of winter; it
was as cold as death off Cape Cod, there. WHY
shouidnt they come ashore? If they hadn't
i;'hded there would be some reason i'm ceebrat-
ING the fact. 1t would have been case of
monumental Observation-Disclosures which the world
would not willingly let die. Ifit had been you
gentlemen, you probably wouldn't have landed
but you have no shadow of right to be celebrat-
ing III your ancestors. gifts which they did not
exercise, but only transmitted WHY. TO be
celebrating the mere landing of the pilgrims
10 he trying TO make out that this most natural
ana simple, and customary procedure was an
extraordinary circumstance-a circumstance to
De amazed at and admired. aggrandiZed and
glOrlhed, at orgies like this for 260 years--hang
", horse would have known enough to land: a
horse-pardon again;the gentleman on my right
assures me that it was not merely the landing of
the pilgrims that We are celebrating but the
pilgrims themselves. So We have struck an
inconsistency here-One says it was the landing
the other says it was the pilgrims. 1t is an in
consistency characteristic OF your ntractable and
dlsputatious tribe, for you never agree about
anything but Boston. Well then what do YOU
want to celebrate those pilgrims for They were
q mighty hard lOt-you know it. | grant vou
without the slightest unwiingness. that they
were deal more gentle and nercifu and lust
than were the peoples of Europe of that day:
grant you that they We're better than their prede-
ceSsOrs. But what of that? that is nothing. PeO-
pie always progress. 4ou are better than your
fathers and grandfathers were (this is the first
time have ever aimed a measureless slander at
the departed, for consider such things imprO-
per- Yes, those among you who have not been
In the penitentiary, if such there be, are better
than your fathers and grandfathers were but is
that any sufficient reason for getting up annual
dinners anu celebrating you? No. by no means
by no means. Well, l repeat those pilgrims
were hard lot They took good care of them
selves. but they abolished every body else's ances-
tors. l am border ruffian from the banner
state of Missouri; I am Connecticut Yankee by
adoption. In me you have Missouri morals
Connecticut culture; this, gentlemen, is the
combination which makes the perfect man. But
where are my ancestors? Whom shall cele-
brate? Where shall l find the raw material?
My first American ancestor. gentlemen, was an
Indian; an early Indian; your ancestors skinned
MIN alive. and am an orphan. Not one drop
of my blood flows in that Indians veins to-
day. 1 stand here, lone and forlorn, without an
ancestor.
Later ancestors of mine were the Ouakers
| William Robinson, Marmaduke Stevenson ct al.
1Our tribe chased them out of the country for
| their religions sake; promised them death if
they came back, for your ancestors had forsaken
! tiie MONIES they loved and braved the perils OF
| the sea. the implacable climate and the savage
! wilderness to acquire that highest and most
! precious of bOOns-freedOm for every man on
this broad continent to worship according to the
| dictates of his own conscience: and they were
not going to allow lot of pestiferOus Quakers
TO Interfere with it. Your ancestors broke
| forever the chains of political slavery and gave
the vote to every man in this wide land. eXclud-
| ing none None except those who did not be-
| long to the orthodox church. Your ancestors
| YES they were a hard lot: but, nevertheless
they gave US religious liberty to worship as they
required us to worship, and political liberty to
vote as the Church required. and so, |, the be-
re1t one: l. the fOrlOrn one. am here to do INV
best to help them celebrate them right The
Quaker woman, Elizabeth HootOn. was an
ancestresS of mine. Your people were
pretty severe with her-yOu will confess that
| But, poor thing. l believe they changed
her opinions before she died. and took her into
their fold, and so We have every reason to pre-
sume that Y hen she died she went to the same
| ancestors tn il a
great pity, for she was good woman. Roger
| Williams was all ancestor of mine. | don't really
remember what your people did with him.
But they banished him to Rhode Island anyway.
And then. believe, recognizing that it was re-
ally carrying harshness to an unjustliable ex-
treIne, they took pity on him and burned him.
They were hard lot. All those Salem witches
were ancestors of mine. Your people made it
tropical for them. Yes they did; by pressure
and the gallOws they made such clean deal
with them that there hasn't been a witch and
hardly halter in our family from that day to
this. and that is 1S9 years. The first slave
brought into New England ont of Africa by
your prOgenltOr was an ancestor of mne for [
am of q mixed breed, an infinitely shaded and
exquisite mOngrel. am not one of your sham
meerschaums that you can color in a week. No.
my complexion is the patient art of eight gen
eratlOns. Well, in my own time had acquired
lot of my kin-by purchase and swapping
around and one way and anOther-and was
born peryersity of your lineage. you got up
war and took them all away from me. And so,
again am bereft. again am 1 forlorn; no drop
of my blood flows in the veins Of any living be-
ing who is marketable.
''Oh my friends hear me and reform! seek
your good, not mine. You have heard the
speeches. disband these New England societies
nurseries OF a system of steadily augmentng
laudatiOn and hOsannahing which, if persisted
in. uncurbed, may some day in the remote fu-
ture beguile you into prevaricating and brag-
ging. Oh. stop. stop. while you are still tenn
perate in your appreciation of your ancestors
Hear me. beseech you; get up an action and
sell Plymouth Rock! The pilgrims were simple
and ignorant race; they never had seen any good
rocks before. or at least any that were not
watched, and SO they were excusable for hop
ping ashore in frantic delight and clapping and
iron fence around this one; but you, gentlemen,
are educated: you are enlightened; you know
that in the rich land of your nativity, Opulent
New England. OverdOwing with rocks this one
isn't worth. at the outside more than thrty-fiye
cents. Therefore. sell it before it is I'M ured by
exposure, or at least throw it open to the patent
medicine advertisements and it earn its taxes
'.Yes, hear your true friend-yOur only true
friend-list to his voice. Disband these sOce-
ties. hotbeds OF vice. of moral decay; perpetua-
tors Of ancestral superstition. Here on this
board see water. l milk. ] see the wild
and deadly lemonade. These are but steps upon
- a t< N.x% ctaI IGxsa FOO