The Robesonian. [volume] (Lumberton, N.C.) 1870-current, 1910-04-28
MARK TWAIN.


Twain's life is soon told. Like
most jewellers in the imagination,
his significance to posterlty lies
not, as with men Of action, IN
how he wrought upon events but
rather in how events wrought
upon him; for from such reac-
tions resulted his imaginative
output-one of the most consld-
cradle of his time and, as it now
seems, one of the securest.
Briefly, then, Mark Twain was
born Samuel Langhorne Clemens
in Florida. Mo-, on November 30,
1885. my parents, he writes,
in his own Burlesque Autobiog-
raphy, ,,were neither very poor
nor conspicuously honest:
The earliest ancestor the TWalns
have any record of was friend
of the family by the name OF
Higgins" The county chronl-
cles have it that the elder Glenn
ems failed in business and died,
leaving his son the ample world
to make his fortune in.
Accordingly, Mark Twain's &C
quaintance with literature began
in putting words into type, not
ideas into words. Educated on
ly in the public schools, he was
apprenticed to a printer at thir-
teen and worked at his trade in
st. Louis, Cincinnati. Philadel-
phia and New York, until at
eighteen he could crafty a boy
ish ambition to become cub to a
Mississippi river pilot. Both
these desperate happenings re-
acted profoundly on his later life.
Varied and eventful as that life
was, it might almost be said that
only two things happened to
Mark Twain-he learned the riv-
er and he learned to set type.
His knowledge of river life, &C
quired when he was pilot took
form in tom Sawyer, - 'Huck-
leberry Finn" and Life on the
Mississippi regarded abroad as
his surest title to fame. 1t even
suggested his psuedonym fol
MARK Twain" is linesman, S
cry to the pilot in shallow stages
And his familiarity with print.
ing turned him naturally first in
to newspaper work, then into
creative writing, and finally into
the publishing business wherein
like Sir Walter Scott, he suffered
a bankruptcy disastrous to every
thing but his honor, and like Sil
Walter again, paid off by his per
debts not Of his own making.
In due time Mark Twain be
came full-fedged pilot. H,
tells the rest himself, in a chap
ter of Life on the Mississippi.
by and by the war came
commerce was suspended, m,
occupation was gone.
Il had to seek another liveli
hood. So | became a silver min
err, in Nevada; next, a gold min
er, in California; next, a report
er in San Francisco; next, a spe
cial correspondent in the Sand
witch islands; next, a rowing cor
respondent in Europe and tn
East; next, an Instructions
torchbearer on the lecture plat
form. and, finally, | became
scribbler of books, and an i'm
movable fixture among the othe
rocks of New England"
This was in 1872, a year ate
he had married Miss Olivia |
Langdon of Elmira, N. Y, VIII
brought him an independent TO.
tune. At that time, his wri
ings were in growing demant
he had an assured income, h
own home. and seemed indeed
fixture. But in 1885 his popula
ity as an author and his acquain
ance with the mechanics of tt
publishing trade-besides beir
a practical printer he had be-
part owner of The Buffalo E
press before his marriage DIRE
him into the firm of C. l.. We
ster & Co.. publishers. The fir
brought out the memoirs of &c
eral Grant and paid his wide
$3.50, 600, but it's prosperity W
shortlived, and it failed with l
bilities of $4,000. The failu
had already sucked in $65, 900
Mark Twain's cash, but he Diet.
mined also to shoulder the deb
and to pay them off undertook
1856 lecture trip around
world.
Deafness Cannot be Cured
by local applications, as they can
reach the diseased portion of the e
- Jaa e.