Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1886-01-23
From the New yort- ann

He Delights the Typothese with Com.
pOsiRg Room Memories.
From the New York sun.
Typothetse, association of New Workers
having more less to do with types CONNIE
morated the birthday of Benjamin Franklin by
a dinner at Delmonicos, which was enjoyed by
over 200 guests.
Mark Twsin's text was "The Composition"
This Is what he said:
al am staggered by the compliments which
have been lavished and poured out on me by
my friend on my right (Mr. Bailey. am as
proud OF this compliment as 1 am staggered. 1t
IL uncommon in my experience. 1t is the first
time that anybody in my experience has stood
up N the pTesenGs Oh large and respectable as
that have told the truth once. II could re-
turn the compliment would do it. Laughter
The chairman's historical "reminiscences of
Gutenberg have caused me to fall into reminis-
cences, for 1 myself am something of an anti
guilty. tLaughter.l All things change in the
procession of years, and 1t may be that am
among strangers. 1t may be that the printer of
today Is not the printer of thirty,fve years
well. built his fire for him in the winter
mornings; brought his water from the village
type from under his stand; and ii he was there
to see, put the good type in his case and the
wasn't there to see, dumped it ali with the
'pi' on the imposing stone-for that was the fur
tive fashion of the cub, and was a cut. wetted
down the paper Saturdays turned it Sum
dayS-fer this was country weekly; rolled,
washed the rollers, / washed the forms, / folded
the papers, carried them around at dawn
Thursday mornings, envelOped the papers
that were for the native had hundred town
subscribers and three hundred and fifty
country ones; the town subscribers paid in
groceries and the country ones in cabbages
and cordwood-when they paid at all, which
was merely sometimes, and then we always
stated the tact in the paper, and gave them a
Every man on the town list helped edit the
thing; that is, he gave orders as to how it was
TO be edited; dictated its opinions, marked out
its course for 1t. and every time the boss failed
to connect, he stopped his paper. We were just
infested with critics, and we tried to satisfy
paid cash, and he was more trouble to us than
all the rest. He bought us, once a year. body
and soul for two dollars. He used to modify
our politics every which way, and he made us
change our religion four times in five years.
IL We ever tried to reason with him, he would
meant bankruptcy and destruction. That man
used to write articles column and a half long,
loaded long primer, and sign them Junius' or
'Veriias' or 'Vox POpuii,' or some other high
sounding rot; and then, after it was set up, he
would come in and say he had changed his
mind-which was gilded figure of speech, be-
cause he hadn't any-and order it to be left out.
We couldn't stand such waste as that; we
could AFFORD bogus in that office; SO We always
credited the article to the rival paper in the
next village, and put it in. Well, we did have
one or two kinds of bogus Whenever there
was barbecue, or a circus, or n baptizing, we
Knocked Off for half a day; and then to make up
for snort matter we would turn over adS'-turn
over the whole page and duplicate it, The
other bogus was deep philosophical stuff, which
We judged nobody ever read; so we kept a gal
ley OF IT standing and kept on slapping the
same sam Old patches OF it in, every now and then,
till it got dangerous. Also, in the early days OF
the telegraph we used to economic on the
news. We picked out the items that were
pointless and barren OF information and stood
them a galley and changed the dates and
localities and used them over and over again
till the public interest in them was worn to the
bone. We marked the ads, but we seldom paid
any attention to the marks afterward; so the
life OF I'd ad and a 'tr ad was equally eternal.
have seen a It'd notice of a sheriff's sale still
booming serenely along two years after the sale
was over, the sheriff dead, and the whole cir
cumstance become ancient history. Most of the
yearly ads were patent medicine stereotypes,
and We used to fence with them. Life was
easy with Us; if We pied u form we suspended
till next week, and We always suspended every
now and then when the fishing was good and
explained it by the illness OF the editor, a
paltry excuse, because that kind of a paper
was just as we'll off with sick editor as a well
one, and better Oft with a dead one than with
either of them. He was full of blessed egotism
and placid self-importance, but he didn't know
as much a 3-m quad. He never set any
type except in the rush OF the last day, and
then he would smouch all the poetry, and leave
the rest TO je1f Tor the solid takes. He wrote
with impressive hatuience and soaring conf
dence upon the vastest subjects; but puff
ting aims gifts OF wedding cake, salty
Ice cream, abnormal watermelOnS, and
sweet potatoes the size of your leg
was his best hold. He was always a poet-a
kind of poet of the carriers address breed
aud whenever his intellect suppurated, and he
read the result to the printers and asked for
their opinion they were very frank and
straightforward about ii. They generally
scraped their rules on the boxes all the time
he was reading, and called it hog wash when
he got through. All this was thirty-five
years ago, when the man who could set
200 an hour could put on just many airs as
he wanted to; and if these New York men, who
recently on a wager set 1000 an hour solid
mlnlon for four hours on a stretch, had ap-
peared in that office, they would have been re-
ceived as accOEplishers of the supremacy i'm
possible, and drenched with hospitable beer
till the brewery was bankrupt.
Il can see that printing office of prehistoritc
times yet, with its horse bills ON the walls, it's
ID boxes ciogged with tallOw because we as
ways stood the candle in the * box night
its towel, which was not considered soiled
until IL could stand alone, and other signs and
sy mbOis that marked the establishment OF that
kind III the Mississippi valley; and / can see
also the tramping jour vino fitted by in the
summer and tarried day, with his wallet
stuffed with one shirt and a hatful of handbills:
Tor III he cOuidn { get any type TO set he would
do a temperance lecture. His way of life was
simple, his needs not complex; all he wanted
was plate and bed and money enough to get
drunk on and he was satisfied. But it may be-
as have said, that among strangers and
sing the giOrles OF forgotten age to unfamil-
lar ears, so will make even and STOP"