P. S.--The reaction is beginning and my stock is looking up. I am
getting the bulliest offers for books and almanacs; am flooded with
lecture invitations, and one periodical offers me $6,000 cash for
12 articles, of any length and on any subject, treated humorously or
otherwise.
The suggested dedication “to the late Cain” may have been the
humoristic impulse of the moment. At all events, it did not
materialize.
Clemens's enthusiasm for work was now such that he agreed with
Redpath to return to the platform that autumn, and he began at once
writing lectures. His disposal of the Buffalo paper had left him
considerably in debt, and platforming was a sure and quick method of
retrenchment. More than once in the years ahead Mark Twain would
return to travel and one-night stands to lift a burden of debt.
Brief letters to Redpath of this time have an interest and even a
humor of their own.
*****
Letters to James Redpath, in Boston:
ELMIRA, June 27, 1871.
DEAR RED,--Wrote another lecture--a third one-today. It is the one I
am going to deliver. I think I shall call it “Reminiscences of Some
Pleasant Characters Whom I Have Met,” (or should the “whom” be left
out?) It covers my whole acquaintance--kings, lunatics, idiots and all.
Suppose you give the item a start in the Boston papers. If I write fifty
lectures I shall only choose one and talk that one only.
No sir: Don't you put that scarecrow (portrait) from the Galaxy in, I
won't stand that nightmare.
Yours,
MARK.
ELMIRA, July 10, 1871.
DEAR REDPATH,--I never made a success of a lecture delivered in a church
yet. People are afraid to laugh in a church. They can't be made to do it
in any possible way.
Success to Fall's carbuncle and many happy returns.
Yours,
MARK.
*****
To Mr. Fall, in Boston:
ELMIRA, N. Y. July 20, 1871.
FRIEND FALL,--Redpath tells me to blow up. Here goes! I wanted you to
scare Rondout off with a big price. $125 ain't big. I got $100 the first
time I ever talked there and now they have a much larger hall. It is
a hard town to get to--I run a chance of getting caught by the ice and
missing next engagement. Make the price $150 and let them draw out.
Yours
MARK
*****
Letters to James Redpath, in Boston:
HARTFORD, Tuesday Aug. 8, 1871.
DEAR RED,--I am different from other women; my mind changes oftener.
People who have no mind can easily be steadfast and firm, but when a
man is loaded down to the guards with it, as I am, every heavy sea of
foreboding or inclination, maybe of indolence, shifts the cargo. See?
Therefore, if you will notice, one week I am likely to give rigid
instructions to confine me to New England; next week, send me to
Arizona; the next week withdraw my name; the next week give you full
untrammelled swing; and the week following modify it. You must try to
keep the run of my mind, Redpath, it is your business being the agent,
and it always was too many for me. It appears to me to be one of the
finest pieces of mechanism I have ever met with. Now about the
West, this week, I am willing that you shall retain all the Western
engagements. But what I shall want next week is still with God.
Let us not profane the mysteries with soiled hands and prying eyes of
sin.
Yours,
MARK.
P. S. Shall be here 2 weeks, will run up there when Nasby comes.
ELMIRA, N. Y. Sept. 15, 1871.
DEAR REDPATH,--I wish you would get me released from the lecture at
Buffalo. I mortally hate that society there, and I don't doubt they
hired me. I once gave them a packed house free of charge, and they never
even had the common politeness to thank me. They left me to shift
for myself, too, a la Bret Harte at Harvard. Get me rid of Buffalo!
Otherwise I'll have no recourse left but to get sick the day I lecture
there. I can get sick easy enough, by the simple process of saying the
word--well never mind what word--I am not going to lecture there.
Yours,
MARK.
BUFFALO, Sept. 26, 1871.
DEAR REDPATH,--We have thought it all over and decided that we can't
possibly talk after Feb. 2.