Mark Twain worked steadily on his book that sad winter and
managed to keep the gloom out of his chapters, though it is
noticeable that 'Following the Equator' is more serious than
his other books of travel. He wrote few letters, and these
only to his three closest friends, Howells, Twichell, and
Rogers. In the letter to Twichell, which follows, there is
mention of two unfinished manuscripts which he expects to
resume. One of these was a dream story, enthusiastically
begun, but perhaps with insufficient plot to carry it
through, for it never reached conclusion. He had already
tried it in one or two forms and would begin it again
presently. The identity of the other tale is uncertain.
*****
To Rev. J. H. Twichell, in Hartford:
LONDON, Jan. 19, '97.
DEAR JOE,--Do I want you to write to me? Indeed I do. I do not want most
people to write, but I do want you to do it. The others break my heart,
but you will not. You have a something divine in you that is not in
other men. You have the touch that heals, not lacerates. And you know
the secret places of our hearts. You know our life--the outside of
it--as the others do--and the inside of it--which they do not. You have
seen our whole voyage. You have seen us go to sea, a cloud of sail--and
the flag at the peak; and you see us now, chartless, adrift--derelicts;
battered, water-logged, our sails a ruck of rags, our pride gone. For it
is gone. And there is nothing in its place. The vanity of life was all
we had, and there is no more vanity left in us. We are even ashamed of
that we had; ashamed that we trusted the promises of life and builded
high--to come to this!
I did know that Susy was part of us; I did not know that she could go
away; I did not know that she could go away, and take our lives with
her, yet leave our dull bodies behind. And I did not know what she was.
To me she was but treasure in the bank; the amount known, the need
to look at it daily, handle it, weigh it, count it, realize it, not
necessary; and now that I would do it, it is too late; they tell me
it is not there, has vanished away in a night, the bank is broken, my
fortune is gone, I am a pauper. How am I to comprehend this? How am I to
have it? Why am I robbed, and who is benefited?
Ah, well, Susy died at home. She had that privilege. Her dying eyes
rested upon nothing that was strange to them, but only upon things which
they had known and loved always and which had made her young years glad;
and she had you, and Sue, and Katy, and John, and Ellen. This was happy
fortune--I am thankful that it was vouchsafed to her. If she had died
in another house-well, I think I could not have borne that. To us, our
house was not unsentient matter--it had a heart, and a soul, and eyes to
see us with; and approvals, and solicitudes, and deep sympathies; it was
of us, and we were in its confidence, and lived in its grace and in the
peace of its benediction. We never came home from an absence that its
face did not light up and speak out its eloquent welcome--and we could
not enter it unmoved. And could we now, oh, now, in spirit we should
enter it unshod.
I am trying to add to the “assets” which you estimate so generously.
No, I am not. The thought is not in my mind. My purpose is other. I am
working, but it is for the sake of the work--the “surcease of sorrow”
that is found there. I work all the days, and trouble vanishes away when
I use that magic. This book will not long stand between it and me, now;
but that is no matter, I have many unwritten books to fly to for my
preservation; the interval between the finishing of this one and
the beginning of the next will not be more than an hour, at most.
Continuances, I mean; for two of them are already well along--in fact
have reached exactly the same stage in their journey: 19,000 words each.
The present one will contain 180,000 words--130,000 are done. I am well
protected; but Livy! She has nothing in the world to turn to; nothing
but housekeeping, and doing things for the children and me. She does not
see people, and cannot; books have lost their interest for her. She
sits solitary; and all the day, and all the days, wonders how it all
happened, and why. We others were always busy with our affairs, but
Susy was her comrade--had to be driven from her loving
persecutions--sometimes at 1 in the morning. To Livy the persecutions
were welcome. It was heaven to her to be plagued like that. But it is
ended now. Livy stands so in need of help; and none among us all could
help her like you.
Some day you and I will walk again, Joe, and talk. I hope so. We could
have such talks! We are all grateful to you and Harmony--how grateful
it is not given to us to say in words. We pay as we can, in love; and in
this coin practicing no economy.
Good bye, dear old Joe!
MARK.
The letters to Mr. Rogers were, for the most part, on matters of
business, but in one of them he said: “I am going to write with all
my might on this book, and follow it up with others as fast as I can
in the hope that within three years I can clear out the stuff that
is in me waiting to be written, and that I shall then die in the
promptest kind of a way and no fooling around.” And in one he
wrote: “You are the best friend ever a man had, and the surest.”
*****