Albuquerque morning journal. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1903-1926, 1910-04-22

his uGCll1lnR wears WIS tue hINl buA
posi- of Methodism in New England
and it was among the hills of Reddlne
that General Putnam. of Revolution
any fame, mustered his sparse ranks
4 Putnam Park now cncloscs the mem
ory OF his camp.
Mark Twain first heard Of il AT the
dinner given him on his seventeen
birthday when fellow guest who liv-
ed there mentioned its beauties and
added there was vacant house add
joining his own.
n tnmk YOU may buy that old house
for me, he said
sherwood Place was the delectable
name of that old house, and where il
stood Mark Twain reared the white
walls of the Italian villa he first
named ''lnnocents at Home, but q
first experience of what a New Eng
land winter storm can be in its whit
est fury quickly caused him to christ
en- il anew. "Stormfield,
The house has been thus described
by Albert BiGelow Paine
Set on a fair hillside, With such n
green slope below such view out
spread across the valley as made one
catch his breath little when h.
first turned to look at it, 4 trout
stream flows through one of the
. inftN0NS. titit are T1Dit trees Ul,
gray stone walls. The entrance to the
hill is a winding. leafy lane.
Through these lands the innocent
at Home loved TO wander in his
white flannels for homelY gossip with
his neighbors. They remember him
best. rs one, who above all things.
loved n good listener. for Mark was
Ia mighty talker, stored with fairy
TALES for the little maids he adored
and racier, ruddier speech for more
stalWart masculine ears. II is a legend
that he was vastly proud of his
famous mop of white hair and used
to spend the pains of a court lady in
getting il to Just the proper stage Of
artistic disarray.
Last summer the walks hegan to
lalter last fan they ceased for good.
The death of H. H. Rogers, "a close
friend, was severe blow The death
of his daughter, Jane, who was seized
with an attack of epilepsy last fall
while in her bath, was n hard blow
from which he never recovered It
was then that the stabbins pains in
his heart began.
Mark Twain died as truly as ii can
be said Of any man, of a broken heart.
The mere chronology of Mark
TWains life is soon told. Like most
dwellers in the Imagination his sig
nificance to posteritY lies, not as with
men OF action, in how he wrought
upon events. but rather in how events
wrought upon him; for from such ac-
tions of his time, and as it now seems
one Of the most secure
Briefly, then, Mark Twain was born
Samuel l.anghorn Clemens, in Florida.
Mo, November 80, 1885.
My parents, he writes in his own
burlesque autobiography, were neith-
er very poor nor conspicuously hon
est Tho earliest ancestor the Twains
have any recollection of was friend
of the family by the name of Higgins
The county chronicles have it that
the elder Clemens failed in business
and died, leaving his son the ample
world to make his fortune in.
Accordingly. Mark Twain's ac-
auaintauce with literature began in
putting words into type, not ideas into
words. Educated only in public
schools he was apprentced to prin-
ter at thirteen. and worked at his
trade in St Louis, Cincinnati, Phila-
delphia and New York until at eieh-
teen he could glatily a boyish ann
bition to become Il cub to Il Alissis-
sippi river pilot
Both these happenings reacted pro-
foundly in his later life His knowl-
edge of river life. acquired when he
was pilot, took form in Tom Saw
YER "1uclVleherrN Mnn, ana Life
on the Mississippi, regarded abroad
MS his tlst title to fame 1t even
suggested his pseudonym. for Mark
Twain is a leadsman $ cry to the pilot
in shallow stages
And his familiarity with printing
turned him naturally first into news
paper work, then into creative writ
lne and finally into the publishing
business wherein, like Sir Walter
Scott, he suffered bankruptcy dis
astrous to everything but his honor.
and like Sir Walter again, paid orr
with his pen debts not of his own
making.
In due time Mark Twain became a
iull-fledged pilot. He tells the rest
OF it himself in a chapter of life on
the Mississippi, by and by the war
came, commerce was suspended, my 7
occupation was gone
II had to seek other employment, (
so | became silver miner in Nevada, I
q gold miner in California; next re (
porter in san Francisco, next spe- /.
cial correspondent in the Sandwich /.
island; next a rowing correspondent IN
Europe and the east. next an instruc-
tional torch bearer on the platform, I
and, finally | became a scribbler OF Z
DpOkH anu an iHAHiNN f'f'iN iifAtN''
among the other rocks of New Eng
land"
This was in 1872, two years after /
he had married Olivia J.. l.angdon o. (
Elmira, y. Y VINO brought him an .
fortune. At that time
his writings were in great demand. +
he had an assured income his own .
home ana income and seemed indie
pendent But i'm 1876 his popularity .
as an author, ana his acquaintance
with the mechanics of the publishing .
ira de-bcsides being practical I
printer he had been part owner of .
The Buffalo Press before his mar
him into the firm OF G. f
l.. Webster & CO., publishers. The
firm brought out the memoirs OF
General Grant and paid his widow
$3.50. 900, but its prosperity was short
lfved. and it failed with liabilities OF
S 96, 900. The failure had already
taken $4,000 of Mark TWains cash.
but he determined also 10 shoulder
The debts and 10 pay them OIL. un-
iertook in 1S95-6 lecture tllp T
around the world.
Mark Twain was an inNeterate .
smoker and one of the most leisure
Iv men in tho world An old press
man who WAS printers devil IN an
office where Mark was AN editorial (
writer tells this anccdote of his
habits of work;
"One of my duties was TO sweep
.he room where editors worked.
49,. 4,.- Nf.rls t.,uff give me "a