The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-12-03
MARK TWAIN TALKS ON SUMMER HOMES Likes the Climate Found in
 New Hampshire IT MADE HIM WORK HARD Veteran Humorist Gives His Idea of What Should Constitute a Com
 fortable Summer Residence.
 About His Neighbors.
IT MADE HIM WORK HARD

Mark Twain has just come to the con clusion that he has solved in Dublin, N. H.. the difficulty of summer life, which has been puzzle to him for many years, says the New York World
 'Yes," he said, when asked about the matter, q have tried number of sum- mer homes, here and in Europe together.
 Each of these homes had charms of it's own; charms and delights of it's own, and some of them-even in Europe-had com forts Several of them had conveniences, too. They all had view
 Tt is my conviction that there should always be some water in view-a lake or a river, but not the ocean, if you are down on it's level. I think that when you are down on it's level it seldom inflames you with an ecstasy which you could not get out of sand flat It is like being on board ship, over again; indeed, it is worse than that, for there's three months of it. On board ship one tires of the aspects in couple of days, and quits looking The same vast circle of heaving bumps is spread around you all the time, with you in the center of it, and never gaining an inch on the horizon, so far as you can see; for variety, a flight of flying fish, mornings; a flock of porpoises throwing somersaults, afternoons; a remote whale spouting Sundays occasional phos- phorescant effects, nights; every other day a streak of black smoke trailing along under the horizon; on the one single red letter day, the illustrious iceberg. l have seen that iceberg thirty-four times III thirty-seven voyages; it Is always the same shape, it is always the same size it always throws up the same old flash when the sun strikes 1t; you may set It on any New York doorstep of a June morning and light it up with a mirror flash, and I will engage to recognize it. It is artificial, and is provided and anchored out by the steamer companies I used to like the sea, but l was young then, and could easily get excited over any kind of monotony, and keep it up till the monotonies ran out, if it was fort night.
 New Hampshire Good Place.
 Hast January, when we were beginning to inquire about a home for this sum mer, I remembered that Abbott Thayer had said, three years before, that the New Hampshire highlands was good place. He was right-it is a good place.
  paint is good for an artist in morals and ink Brush Is here, too; so is Colonel T. w. Higginson; so Is Raphael Pumpel- ly; so is MT. Secretary Hitchcock; so Is Henderson; so is Learned: so Is Sumner; so is Franklin MacVeagh; so is Joseph l.. Smith; so is Henry Copley Greene. when I am not occupying his house, which I am doing this season. Paint, literature, science, statesmanship. history, profess Je oil scented here, yet crime Is substantially unknown.
 "'The summer homes of these refugees are sprinlSled. a mile apart, among the forest-clad hills. with access to each other by firm and smooth country roads which are so embowered in dense foliage that it is always twilight In there. and com fortable The forests are spider-webbei Il with these good roads. they go every where: but for the help of the guide boards. the stranger would not arrive any where.
 ."The villa ge-Dublin-is punched togeth- CT in its own place. but good telephone service makes it's markets handy to all those outliars. have spelt 1t that way to be witty. The village executes orders on the Boston plan-promptness and courtesy
 Houses Hiuh-Porched.
 ''The summer homes are high-perched, as a rule, and have contenting outlooks. The house we occupy has one. Monadnock a soaring double hump. rises into the sky at it's left elbow-that is to say, 1t is close at hand From the base of the long slant of the mountain the valley spreads away to the circling frame of hills, and beyond the frame the blllowy sweep of remote great ranges rise to view and flows, fold upon fold, wave upon wave, soft and blue and unwordly to the horizon fifty miles away. In these October days Monadnock and the valley and it's framing hills make an inspiring picture to look at, for they are sumptuously splashed and mottled and betorched from skyline to skyline with the richest dyes the autumn can furnish; and when they lie flaming in the full drench of the md-afternoon sun the sight affects the spectator physically, it stirs his blood like military music.
 "These summer homes are commodious, we'll built and well furnished-facts which sufficiently indicate that the owners built them to live in themselves. They have