The daily Alaskan., 1912-03-28
RECKLESS SPORT.
Rock Rolling Feats of Mark Twain In His BOyhood Days.
A BAD SCARE ENDED THE FUN

lHS Flnai FTdHk on 10ilOayS Flnl
 Was In Fair Way of Ending In a
 Tragedy When the Danger Was, by a
 Bit of Good Luck, Narrowly Averted.
 Writing on Mark Twain" in liar. per's Magazine. Albert Bigelow Paine recounts some Of the scrapes of the youthful sam Clemens Sam was a recognized ringleader among his play mates, and one of the prauks they played nearly had fatal termination.
 "One of their SunIay pnstlmes was to climb Holidays hill and roll down big stones 10 frirhten the people who were driving to church Holidays hill above the rcad was steep \ stone, once started would cn pnnp!ng and leaping down and bound across the road with the deadi. sv fitness of a twelve inch shell Th,.luyS would get stone poised. then wait unIi they saw team approaching and. calcu- lating the diStuucr would give it a start. Dropping Gnva behind the bush es, they would wa,s h thr dramatic eff feet upon the chur hgocrs as the great missile shot across the road a few yards before them
 This was Homeric sport. but they carried it too far Stones that had a habit of getting loose so numerously on Sundays and so rarely on other days invited suspicion, and the pat terollers'-riye patrol. q kind of police of those days-werc put on the watch So the boys found other diversions un- til the patteroIlcrS did not watch any more Then they planned a grand coup that should eclipse anything be fore attempted in the stone rolling line.
 "A rock ubout the size of an omnibus was lying up there in a good position 10 go downhiIl. once started They de cided it would be glorious thing to see that great bowlder go smashing down hundred yards or so in front of some unSuSpeytiug and peaceful minded churchguer Quarrymen were getting out rock moi far away and left their picks and shoyelS over Sundays The boys borrowed these and went to work to undermine the biz stone IL was a heavier job than they had count ed on, but they worked faithfully Sun day after Sunday If their parents had wanted them 10 work like that they would have thought they were be ing killed
 Finally one Sunday while they were digging it suddenly got loose and start ed down They were not quitc ready for it. Nobody was coming but an old colored man in cart. so it was going to be wasted lt was net quite vast ed, however. They had planned for a thrilling result, and there waS thrill enough while it lasted ln the first place. the stone nearly caught Will Bowen when it started John Briggs had just that moment quit digging and banded Win the pick Win was about to step into the excavation when sam Clemens. who was already there. leaped out with yell:
 Hook out. boys shes comingE
 she came The huge stone kept to the ground at first, then, gathering a wild momentum. it went bounding into the air. About halfway down the hill it struck a tree several inches thick and cut it clean off This turned its course a little. and the negro in the cart, who heard the noise. saw it come crashing in his direction and made a wild effort to whip up his horse. It was also headed toward a cooper shop across the road
 "The boys watched it with growing interest It made longer leaps with every bound. and whenever 1t struck the fragments and dust would fly. They were certain 1t would demOlish the negro and destroy the cooper shop The shop was empty. it being Sunday, but the rest of the catastrophe would invite close investigation and results. It was making mighty leaps now, and the negro had managed to get directly in its path They stood holding theii breath. their mouths open.
 Then suddenly-they could hardly believe their eyes-thP howider struck projection d distance above the road and. with mighty bound. sailed clear over the negro and hiS mule and land ed in the soft dir beyond. only frag- ment striking the shop, damaging but not wrecking it. Half buried in the ground. that powder lay there for nearly forty years Then it was blast ed for milling purposes. It was the last rock the boys ever rolled down. They began to suspect that the sport was not altogether safe,
 "Limelight and the center of the stage was a passion of Sam Clemens boyhood, a love of the spectacular that never wholly died It seems almost a pity that in those old faroff, barefoot days he could not have looked down the years to a time when, with the world at his feet. venerable Oxford should clothe him in a scarlet gown"