The St. Louis Republic. [volume] (St. Louis, Mo.) 1888-1919, 1902-06-08
JOE DCUdhAS
Rait-br.ed Indian. the living 'Injun joe


Raif-breed Indian. the living 'Tnjun joe"
WRITTEN o TIE sUNDA REPUBLIC.
To be at Hannibal with Mark Twain-or
Mr.. Clemens, for at his old home both per-
sons were involved-was a rare treat. It
was to be on the stage at a dramatic mo-
ment IN q remarkable mans life-when, IN
old age, knowing that good-by meant fare
we'll, he onoe more viewed the dingy homo
Of boyhood. met the friends of long ago and
gaZed again upon the hills and the valleys
where Tom Sawyer played hockey"
from school.
Hero lay tho conflict Of personalities, one
Of the chief impressions 1 carried away
from Hannibal. Where Mr.. Clemens went,
stalked tho creations OF Mark Twain.
Where Mr.. Clemens went, indeed, I seemed
TO see Tom Sawyer" himself. treading In
the authors footsteps. shadowing him like
an ether1c double When Mr.. Clemens I'M
expectedly made one OF his irresistible re-
marks, you shrieked with laughter and you
were sure that II was Tom you were with.
No doubt OF II at all. Here was Tom
grown old, polished up. Of course, . lan
among men, now abhorring practical Jokes
as the cheapest form of w.t." but still g
Joker, still Tom.
Then the illusion would be shattered COM
pletely. Mr.. Clemens's emotion-choked ut
terances did not harmonic with the concep-
ton Of Tom Nor do we know that Toms
mother and his father. and his brothers are
buried out there in the grave yard. No. It
Is Mr.. Clemens who sobs. who Is unable to
ind words when he wishes to express his
deep love for old Hannibal. and the true
friends in IT It is he who visits the grave
yard. Mr.. Clemens. an old man. come home
after long absence. who may or may not
have written books: though 1t happens that
he has written them under shelter of an
yther name, dubious shelter, for people
are continually endeavorinE to be "booky"
with him
Rivalry in Regard to
Originals of His Characters.
Phases Of this double-identity were anus
Ing. OF course. a half century ago, when
young sam Clemens went out into the wide
world. IL YVES not realized what a bonanza
he was Brt behold Tom Sawyer. Huck
Finn 81 Co. achieved a world renown.
Hannib awoke to the fact and was proud
that it had produced Tom and Huck. Right
here rose a rivalry. Who was Tom? Who
EuokH Who Becky Thatcher? Who Colonel
Mulberry Sellers and all the rest of them?
Half the population imagined themselves
either the one or the other-au willing can
didates for Immortality.
This state Of Affairs was communicated to
me abruptly. when 1 asked a Hannibal
citizen who the real Tom Sawyer was.
Towns full OF EN-" said he.
Critical analysis weighed all the suggest
ed Toms IN the balance and found them
wanting. save one, and this one was Sam
Clemens. Mr.. Clemens positively refuses
to turn States evidence against himself;
he says that Tom is composite. But If Ed
Pierce and John Briggs, two boyhood
chums. are believed. Tom Sawyer has Sam
Clemens In his composition. Sam was mis-
chievous. Sam was full Of fun. Sam could
play such jokes as no youth in that vicinity
had the wit to play.
Moreover some Of the Incidents In the
book are fastened upon Sam-Mr. Clemens
now. Mrs. Fraser NEE Laura HawkinsJ.
Enthusiastically the first sweetheart OF the
humorist, undeniably Becky Thatcher" is
authority for the truth of the Bible-winning
incident in Tom Sawyer.
Sam had a remarkable aversion for Sun
day school, but he wished to win a Bible.
Five verses recited meant a yellow ticket;
, ten yellow tickets. a red ticket; ten red
' tickets, a blue, and ten blue ones, a Bible.
Sam traded all his valuables, fish hooks and
marbles, with other boys for tickets. He
got a Bible, much to the establishment of
the Sunday-school superintendent
Huckleberry Finn Was q
Ben Blankenship.
Critical analysis seeking Huck Finn finds
him In Ben Blankenship. who is long since
dead. Unfortunate Ben WAS the son of the
town drunkard," we learn. He was below
par socially, yet well up in the estimation
of the boys. For Ben was the son of a
fisherman and had q skiff. Other boys had
no skift and were dependent on Ben's gen
erosity when they wished to go upon the
river. Ben's existence was u~ntrammeled by
conventions, by such demands upon his
time as school and Sunday school. Ben was
the env1ed OF the envied. Hence Huck
Firms laurels are Ben's, and to Ben be the
glory.
From the moment that Mr.. Clemens set
foot in Hannibal the town was his very
own. But such is the contrariness of human
nature that some there were who would not
surrender to Mark Twain. The trouble was
the conflict Of fiction and fact again, and an
inability to see fiction as truth. Somehow
simple-minoed folk had the notion that
everything in the books. scenes of which
ere laid in Hannibal. should be literally
true. Finding them not so in some details,
they confused Mark Twain and Mr.. Glenn
ems and held him to be a prevaricator. That
the fatted calf should be killed for him was
crowning him, declaring him arch-prevari-
Gator. One gentleman, a character all to
himseIf-a subject, 1t would seem, for the
humorist to picture-was jealous. He was
aged, had Lived sixty years In Hannibal