The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1903-03-31
The Original Col. SelIars.

One hears almost annually, Of some
person who was Mark Twain's inspi-
ration for the famous character of Col
Mulberry Sellers-that wonderful opti-
mist who has delighted two genera
tons, taught the lesson of human kind
ness and loving charity as it was never
taught by mortal man, and given
mingled happiness and merriment to
untold thousands of our time. Just
how many persons have received his
enviable distinction, we shall not I'M
dertake to say. They are innumerable
by this time, and we shrink from the
task of asserting and classifying them
with anything like care. Indeed, we
are relieved of that 1aboriouS and futile
undertaking by the sure knowledge
that Mark Twain had originally in
mind the late Thomas A. Harris, OF
Pewee Valley, KY, some fifteen Up
twenty miles to the north Of Louis
vile.
General Harris was a M-issourian-a
man of travel, education. wide expert
ence, indomitable courage, and engaS-
ing manner and appearance. Gifted
far beyond ordinary men in brains, ad-
dress and noble instincts. he was be-
loved in private, successful in affairs,
admired, respected, and confided in by
III III liz I'LL LIN li"NA ANAA-ON
like a genius. and spent them like =
prince. He was a soldier, a poet, an
orator, a bold and shrewd speculatcr.
No one ever lost a dollar through
trusting him. His failure and dis
appointments. touched himself alone
Mark Twain knew him we'll in the old
days before the Civil war; thrilled re-
| sponsive to his conceptions and the al
Turing eloquence with which he gave
! them shape and substance; recognized
his fine character, his noble purpose,
his chivalric soul; felt the full charm
of his amazing personality. And Mark
Twain, in painting Col. Mulberry Sell
lers, merely utilized the pathos and
! the humor and the splendid and beau
tiful b%enevOlence of the mans unique
and brilliant nature.
Senator Vest remembers dear Old
. Tom Harris. 1t was he who in the
! fall of 1861, when Price was besieging
Lexington, Mo-, n when all efforts
to dislodge Mulligan and his imnotal
"Chicago Brigade conceived the x
pedient of the hemp bales and put
the Confederate army behind them
rolling the movable breaStWOrkS up
the hill and over the union fortif, ca
tons to victory. But for Harris gen.
Jus. Lexington would never have
been taken. Thrice the force that
Price had at his could not
4 nave successfully SCOT111eu IHdl
dable height. A veal or so later, Har-
ris was in Richmond seeking a COM
mand. While there. he fell out of a
four-story window, alighting face
downward, on a pile of bricks. Vest
! said of it afterwards: cit would have
killed a snowbird.' In Harris case,
there was only a nose split right down
the middle, and a scar which every
body thought had been made by a sa-
Der in some desperate hand-to hand
conflict with a hated foe.
Harris was the always kind and cour
teous and clean-handed gentleman. He
loved his fellow He was ready
to share his last dollar with any one
who seemed to be in distress or sorrow.
Great thoughts issued from his fruit
full mind. Prodigious schemes and en-
terprises were the children of his in
tellect. Untold millions, in which he
had no share, have been the creatures
Of his light, suggestion. He
never wronged a man or woman He
was incapable Of deceit or pretense.
But when he talked, all men listened.
Out Of the crumbs of his opulent sug-
gestion, others gathered fame n
fortune. And he died poor. He a
made rich. He had distributed
succor, hope, encouragement, as the
sower filings his seed. But he always
saw the bread upon the water and he
never lost his faith in man. He was
Mark Twain's Sellers.-Wash;ngton
Post.