17 June 1868 • San Francisco, Calif. (MS and transcript: CSmH and
San Francisco Morning Call, 17 June 68, UCCL 02735)
I am back to the old place again. I was sail At our table at the Lick House they had a fashion of fining delinquents champagne for the party when they absented themselves from dinner without leave. I never could remember to ask leave, & yet often went out to dinner. The fines cost me more than my board. It was too much luxury. I came home again. Now I can go out to dinner as much as I please, ; I Ⓐemendationin case any one chooses to invite me, & therefore rejoice thou, for I am happy.1explanatory note
This letter of May 26th is the best you have written me—& it convinces me that you are steadily improving, because I always think recognize your last to be the best. I was ever so glad to receive it, & have begun at once to answer it, instead of going on moralizing over the Sphynx. The Sphynx has “kept” for several thousand years, & will doubtless continue to keep until I write to my faithful mother.
No, I am not going to Europe yet. I talked the matter over with Mr Burlingame, for two or three Ⓐemendationhours, & saw that it was both impracticable & inexpedient.
What did I ever write about the Holy Land that was so peculiarly lacerating? The most straight-laced of the preachers here cannot well get through a sermon without turning aside to give me a blast?. ⒶemendationThe last remark reported to me from the pulpit is to “this son of the Devil, Mark Twain!” It is a fine flight of fancy, anyway, isn’t it? If I only get time to write the article I have in my head, I will make that parson climb a tree. Don’t you distress yourself. It is only the small-fry ministers who assail me. All those of high rank & real influence I visit, dine & swap lies with, just the same as ever. They have complained of nothing save the rudeness & coarseness of those Holy Land letters which you did not revise.2explanatory note
Yes’m, I am going to settle down, now, right away. And when I get settled down I will weight myself down so that I shall stay. I will put a brick in my hat the very first thing. And others on top of it from time to time.3explanatory note But josh joking Ⓐemendationaside, I am going to settle down some day, even if I have to do it in a cemetery. I say these things to encourage you, more than e anything else. I do not wish to see you despondent. And you shall not be, as long as I know how to spell, & put up comforting sentences.
O, Geeminy! {That stands for a sigh.} I shall get the Sphynx & the rest of Egypt off my mind to-day, & to-morrow set sail from Alexandria, homeward bound! You cannot imagine what a broader world of pleasant significance is in those words to me, now, voyaging drearily over accumulating reams of paper, than ever they bore to my mind when the Quaker City turned her bows westward. Then, it was the most regretful day to me, of the whole w voyage—now, it is the happiest. Cuss the cussed book, anyhow. I wish I were a profane young man—how I would let fly the adjectives sometimes. But I am staunch & true. Ⓐemendation
I am writing page No. 1,843. 2,343. ⒶemendationI wish you could revise this mountain of MSS. for me. There will be a great deal more than enough for the book when it is finished, & I am glad. I can cut out a vast deal that ought to perish. I mean to only glance at Spain & the islands of the return voyage. If I talked much about the week in Spain I should be sure to char- Ⓐemendationcaricature Miss Newell. It would surely creep in somewhere.4explanatory note
According to the contract, I have to put in that N. Y. Herald valedictory squib which worried you so much—but that is all right. I read it over yesterday, & found that it gave a perfectly accurate idea of the excursion. I have marked som out some sentences. That article is so mild, so gentle, that I can hardly understand how I ever wrote such literary gruel. But I shall not make it more savage. I must have been full of charity & generous feeling when I wrote that—let it stand as a testimony that I am moved by gentle impulses sometimes. You know what they said about me at Gibraltar when I was absent—& O, I could have said such savage things about them, in & — w & would Ⓐemendationhave done, it, too, if they had had full swing in the metropolitan newspapers to reply. Trust me for that, Madam.5explanatory note
I would so much like to write a letter some letters for the Cleveland Herald, but I have gotten myself buried, at last, under such a hill of unliquidated literary obligations that I dare not think of it. I have neglected the Chicago Republican almost entirely, & the New York Tribune & the Magazines Ⓐemendationcompletely. I am very thankful to Mr. Fairbanks for the offer, though, & appreciate his kindness thoroughly. I hope to be less pushed for time, when the book is off my hands.6explanatory note
I have more letters from splendid friends in China & Japan, offering me princely hospitalities for months. Can’t go, now. Did you ever know a China-bred Merchant prince? No? Then you have yet to look upon man in his most the fairest type of man. Ross ⒶemendationBrowne will be here in a few days with a nice sinecure in his Embassy for me—I gave my word that I would take it—& now my stateroom Ⓐemendationis engaged for the States. I sail in the “Sacramento” June 30.—arrive in New York in the “Henry Chauncey” July 22d.7explanatory note
Sp It was splendid for Mollie!8explanatory note I have a second appreciative relative in the family, at any rate. To tell the truth I have a sort of sneaking fondness for “people that it is hard for them to be good,” myself. We shall get along well when the “re-union” Ⓐemendationtranspires. Did Mr. Beach & Emma arrive? Did you go east? Have you seen the other cub?9explanatory note How is the dog? If he neglects to wipe his feet on the mat before he comes in, & is in all places & at all times blundering & heedless, he will do no discredit to his name. But don’t chain him. It makes me restive to think of it.10explanatory note
“When will I come?” Just as soon as engagements in New York & Hartford will permit. Write Ⓐemendationme, care of Dan Slote, 121 William street, & say when any of the other pilgrims will be likely to be there. As I am “touching them on the raw” of occasionally Ⓐemendationin the book—albeit very gently—I would like to shake hands with them—Church especially, who is a bully pilgrim. {There it goes again.}11explanatory note
My kindest regards & fervent good wishes unto yourself & all your Ⓐemendationhousehold.
And now I will tackle the Sphynx again.
in margin: This good-natured, well-meaning ass, “Pipes,” is Stephen Massett—just from Calcutta & Hong-Kong, where he has been giving readings of mine & Artemas Ward’s articles.12explanatory note
enclosure:
“pipes” to “mark twain,” esq
My Dear Sir:—Understanding you are about
leaving for the East in the course of the next
year or two, by the way of
Egypt, will you do
me the favor to take a barrel of pipe-stems and
some lager beer to my friend, the Pasha, whom
I met
at the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly, in Lon-
don, last year, in poor “Artemus Ward’s” com-
pany.
I know you have a good many “things”
to carry for different persons, such as cigars,
and clothes, and
nuggets and bricks, but I
thought from the intimacy that has never exist-
ed between us in the mountains, that I might
ask of you this favor. I heard that the Emperor
Norton was going as your private secretary.
If you accede to my request,
write me through
the columns of the London Times or the Round
Table. Yours,
Jeems Pipes,
Room 1848, Bedlam Block,
Hammersmith, London.
San Francisco, June 14, 1868.
Clemens had returned to the Occidental after a stay of unknown length, in May and June, at the even more opulent Lick House, on the opposite side of Montgomery at Sutter Street. A burlesque menu (almost certainly composed by Clemens) for a 16 May 1868 “Lick House State Banquet given by Messrs. Clemens and Pierson ... At the expense of the Proprietors of the Hotel” suggests the conviviality he found there (see the illustration below).
The cleric responsible for this “fine flight of fancy” has not been identified, but Clemens certainly did encounter such criticism while in San Francisco, and he made several efforts to write a reply to it. One month earlier, on 20 May, George E. Barnes’s Morning Call described (in all likelihood with Clemens himself as a contributing source) two rather different encounters on Sunday, 17 May, both of which tend to support what Clemens said here to Fairbanks:
Mark Twain has been to church. He attended twice last Sunday. Since he returned from the Holy Land he has carefully avoided ministers, the promptings of a guilty conscience having admonished him to beware of them, lest they should “give him a blast,” to use the language of the ungodly. He would dodge around the corner at the sight of a clergyman, as a dog runs from the pound-keeper. But, last Sunday morning he was prevailed upon to attend church, and his mind was greatly relieved upon his being cordially received after service by the officiating clergyman, who, in warm terms, complimented his letters from the Holy Land. He left the church an altered man, and on his way home deviated from the shortest route, in order to pass boldly by numerous churches. He was suddenly seized with a church-going mania, and in the evening hurried to another house of worship. He entered boldly, walked up the aisle with head erect, and took a seat almost immediately “under the droppings of the divine sanctuary.” The clergyman was a new comer, of the Baptist persuasion, and his sermon was eloquent and impressive. He told of the visit of Onesimus to Rome, and the impression made upon the mind of the simple rustic at the sight of such splendor and magnificence, and when he inquired for Paul, how the crowd in that great city jeered and ridiculed him. “And what is ridicule?” asked the clergyman. “It is the argument of small minds on subjects far above their comprehension; it is the weapon of cowards.” In short, he was particularly severe on the subject of ridicule; “and,” said he, “there are the letters of this person, Mark Twain, who visits the Holy Land and ridicules sacred scenes and things. The letters are sought after and eagerly read, because of his puerile attempts at wit, and miserable puns upon subjects which are dear to every Christian heart. It is not right that he should take away the faith of a people without giving them something in return.” In fact, he handled the funny traveller without gloves, and caused many eyes to be turned toward Mr. Twain, who manifested considerable signs of uneasiness. After the service had concluded, Mark advanced to the preacher, and, holding out his hand, said: “Sir, I never receive a good dressing-down which I deserve unless I thank the party for it. I am Mark Twain. I feel that I deserve everything which you have said about me, and I wish to heartily thank you.” The minister was surprised and embarrassed. He had not intended to speak unkindly or unjustly. “Oh, of course not. I could easily see that, by your manner and tone,” replied Mark. “I think you are wrong in the positions you have frequently taken in regard to the Holy Land,” said the clergyman. “I know I am,” replied Mark, “but not altogether.” “Well, no: perhaps not, altogether,” replied the clergyman. After a few more remarks of a kindly nature, Mark retired gracefully, running the gauntlet of the eyes of the whole congregation, who had gathered on the church steps to witness his exit. The scene was witnessed, and the conversation overheard, by a number of the audience. Mark has been heard to say since, that he is aware that he went to great lengths in his Holy Land letters; but then, “Those Pilgrims, you know,” they so worried and annoyed the “missionary,” that, in the heat of momentary passion, he has written many words which his cooler judgment did not approve, and which will not appear in his forthcoming book, which is being prepared in the quiet of his study, away from “Pilgrim” influences. (“Mark Twain at Church”, San Francisco Morning Call, 20 May 68, 1)
Although this report has been dismissed as a fabrication (see Lauber, 228), Clemens himself identified and replied to his critic in a signed manuscript written sometime later that week, addressed to—but never published in—Frederick Marriott’s San Francisco News Letter and California Advertiser (Rowell, 12):
If the Rev. Dr. Thomas, who gave me such a terrific setting-up in his sermon last Sunday night—& in very good grammar, too, for a minister of the gospel—had only traveled with me in the Holy Land, I could have shown him how much real harm is done to religion by the wholesale veneration lavished upon things that are mere excrescences upon it; which mar it; & which should be torn from it by reasoning or carved from it by ridicule. They provoke the sinner to scoff, when he ought to be considering the things about him that are really holy. It is all very well to respect the devotee’s feelings, but let us respect have a thought for the sinner’s failings, at the same time — failings, in the meantime— he has a soul to be saved, as well as the devotee.... The devotee being safe, had better in charity suffer a little, than he that the sinner be damned. (SLC 1868, 10–11)
The Reverend Jesse Burgess Thomas, D.D. (1832–1915), was the new pastor of the First Baptist Church. A graduate of Kenyon College and Rochester Theological Seminary, Thomas left his position at the Pierrepont Street Church, Brooklyn, to take this appointment in San Francisco, preaching there for the first time on 1 March. On 17 May he preached at 1:00 and 7:45 p.m. (San Francisco Examiner: “Religious Intelligence,” 27 Jan 68, 3; “The New Pastor,” 2 Mar 68, 3; “Religious Notices for To-morrow,” San Francisco Evening Bulletin, 16 May 68, 5). Clemens also defended himself in general against the “abuse” he received for what he had written or said about the Holy Land:
I acknowledge that I have written irreverently, but I did it heedlessly, or when out of temper—never in cold blood. I did fail somewhat in reverence for Jacob, whose character all the bookmakers praise so highly, but that was honest. I revered the really holy persons & things & places, & deliberately & intentionally derided only the sham manifest shams. The bookmakers all deride them in private conversation, themselves, but weep over them in their books. (SLC 1868, 7–9)
In May and June Clemens attempted to write at least three other replies to his clerical critics: one early in May, which was left unpublished; another condensed from the first, probably in the first two weeks of June, intended as part of chapter 46 of The Innocents Abroad but ultimately not included; and a third, probably in mid- to late June, which likewise remained unpublished (SLC 1868, SLC 1868, SLC 1868). In the last attempt Clemens said in part:
The Savior & him crucified his doctrines we can all accept, & all revere. “Love one another;” “Do unto others as ye would that they should do unto you.” This religion is good & pure—and rational, & capable of being understood. The Savior lived his doctrine. His example, just as well as his words the mere words of his teachings, are full of usefulness to the world.
Very well. But I do claim the right to protest against the ancient children of Israel & the patriarchs being set up for veneration; against their very bad characters being studiously left uncriticised, & their exceedingly slim virtues being as studiously brought forward & glorified until, the world is deceived into the idea that they the world is defrauded persuaded into the idea that they these men were nothing whatever but miraculous concentrations of virtue & wisdom unalloyed by any demerit; against their wandering, nomadic, unprogressive, pure savagery of their manner of life, ; being and & their insubordination, to rulers & to God, & their cruelty, ferocity, & love of raiding, rapine, & pitiless slaughter of women & children; I do protest against such deeds & customs being offered for praise & emulation....
I wish to say one very suggestive thing in this connection. I cannot find a man—be he preacher, church member or writer—who will speak well of Jacob or the Children of Israel, in private conversation; & I cannot find one who will speak otherwise than well of them in the pulpit or in print. Perhaps some one will explain this mystery to me? If a man think a thing, why not say it? (SLC 1868, 1–2, 22–23)
Clemens could have socialized with any of several San Francisco clergymen he knew, including, among others: the Reverend Horatio Stebbins (1821–1902), pastor of the First Unitarian Church; the Reverend Charles Wadsworth, pastor of Calvary Presbyterian Church (1814–82); Henry Martyn Scudder (1822–95), pastor of Howard Presbyterian Church; and Andrew Leete Stone (1815–92), pastor of the First Congregational Church. Stebbins and Wadsworth were two of the more prominent clergymen in San Francisco; both men delivered morning sermons on 17 May (unlike Scudder and Stone, who preached only in the evening), and therefore either might have been the clergyman who, according to the Call reporter, “complimented his letters from the Holy Land” ( L1 , 369 n. 2; SLC 1868; “Religious Notices for To-morrow,” San Francisco Evening Bulletin, 16 May 68, 5; Langley 1868, 596, 737, 741–42, 744). They were also the clergymen to whom Clemens turned, later in 1868, when he needed character references from San Francisco (see 29 Dec 68 to Langdon, n. 2click to open link).
To put a brick in one’s hat is to become intoxicated. Clemens used the phrase as early as 1852 (Mathews, 1:187; ET&S1 , 70).
Clemens’s apostrophe to the Sphinx was ultimately part of chapter 58 in The Innocents Abroad: a three-page draft of the passage survives, numbered 1256 through 1258 (SLC 1868). A manuscript chapter about his week in Spain, intended for but never published in chapter 59 (very near the end of the book), also survives: it was numbered 1289 through 1331. The page numbers that Clemens wrote here have not been explained. He portrayed Julia Newell in the rejected chapter on Spain with some restraint, merely referring to “our lady with her short traveling dress” (SLC 1868, 1315, quoted in 24 Oct 67 to JLC and family, n. 1click to open link). But despite the promise he made Emma Beach not to “make fun,” he did indulge in a highly irreverent treatment of Murillo’s paintings (10 Feb 68 to Beachclick to open link).
The contract for The Innocents Abroad, dated 16 October 1868 (Contract for The Innocents Abroad click to open link), contains no such stipulation about the 19 November letter to the New York Herald, which Fairbanks and several other passengers had complained of at the time (SLC 1867; 20 Nov 67 to JLC and family 2nd of 2 click to open link). Bliss, however, may well have asked Clemens to include it, and it was reprinted as chapter 61, ostensibly for that reason: “partly because my contract with my publishers makes it compulsory” (SLC 1869, 643). Clemens toned down the language, substituting “refreshments” for “cigars or drinks,” for instance, and he omitted satirical passages on the frequency of prayer meetings and the attempted sale of the ship. The allusion to “what they said about me at Gibraltar when I was absent” is explained in 24 Oct 67 to Goodman, n. 2click to open link.
Clemens wrote nothing expressly for Abel Fairbanks’s Cleveland Herald until November, when he published “A Mystery” there (SLC 1868). Since coming to San Francisco, he had sent nothing to the Tribune, and only two dispatches to the Chicago Republican (SLC 1868 and SLC 1868).
Clemens had been personally acquainted with humorist, author, and traveler John Ross Browne (1821–75) since at least December 1866, when he was a guest at Browne’s home in Oakland (SLC to JLC and family, 4 Dec 66click to open link, L1 , 368, 370 n. 6). They had recently renewed their acquaintance in Washington, and on 1 February Clemens informed his Alta readers of Browne’s nomination to replace Burlingame as minister to China:
J. Ross Browne’s nomination to the Chinese Mission has been sent to the Senate by the President, and there is very little doubt that it will be confirmed. I cordially hope so, partly because he is a good man and a talented one; a literary man and consequently entitled to high honors; and also because he has kindly invited me to take a lucrative position on his staff in case he goes to China, and I have accepted, with that promptness which so distinguishes me when I see a chance to serve my country without damaging my health by working too hard.... I am the only man that can fill the bill. I am able to write a hand that will pass for Chinese in Peking or anywhere else in the world. (SLC 1868)
Clemens persisted in saying publicly that he intended to visit China when his book was finished, but he never did so (SLC 1868; “Mark Twain,” San Francisco Alta California, 6 July 68, 1). Browne, accompanied by his family, arrived in San Francisco from New York on 4 July and left for China on 3 August. He soon decided, however, that he could no longer support the terms of the Burlingame treaty, and in July 1869 resigned his post when the Grant administration hinted its intention to replace him (San Francisco Alta California: “Arrival of the ‘Japan,’” 4 July 68, 1; “The Chinese Mission,” 3 Aug 68, 2; Williams, 199–205). Had Clemens traveled on 30 June, he would have taken the Sacramento from San Francisco and connected with the Arizona (not the Henry Chauncey) for New York (“Ocean Steamers,” San Francisco Alta California, 17 June 68, 4). In fact, he postponed his trip until the following week (see 5 July to Blissclick to open link).
Mary Paine Fairbanks.
Between 10 and 16 June Mrs. Fairbanks and three of her children (Alice, Charles, and Mary) stayed with the Langdons in Elmira, where she almost certainly did see Charles Langdon, the “other cub” (“Langdon Guest Book,” 4).
The Fairbankses had named their recently acquired pet after Clemens; no independent evidence has been found to support Dixon Wecter’s assertion that they had “christened him Mark Twain” ( MTMF , 32 n. 1).
In Colonel Denny’s journal, William F. Church is described as “a tall man rather slender in form with open good countenance and a lip that shows determination of purpose, head whitening with the frosts of about fifty two years, a christian of the Congregational church” (Denny 1867, entry for 11 Sept). According to Paine, when Dan Slote became ill on the trip through the Holy Land, several of the party decided to travel on without him, but Clemens refused, saying: “Gentlemen, I understand that you are going to leave Dan Slote here alone. I’ll be d—d if I do!” ( MTB , 1:337). Paine reported the effect of this statement on Church, “a deacon with orthodox views” who “did not approve” of Clemens, indeed finding him “sinful, irreverent, profane”: “‘He was the worst man I ever knew,’ Church said; then he added, ‘And the best’” ( MTB , 1:336). Paine had this story from Clemens’s Hartford neighbor George H. Warner, who presumably had it from Church himself, but it has not been independently documented ( MTN , 89–90). Moreover, this anecdote is strikingly similar to Clemens’s account of his own illness in Damascus (see 10 Dec 67 to JLC and family, n. 6click to open link).
Although the newspaper clippings Clemens enclosed have not survived, it is reasonably clear what they were, and their texts are therefore reproduced here as enclosures. On 13 June Clemens had published “Important to Whom It May Concern” in the San Francisco News Letter and California Advertiser (SLC 1868), reproduced here in photofacsimile. An imitative and—from Clemens’s perspective—exploitative response to it had appeared on the front page of the 17 June San Francisco Morning Call, reproduced here in type facsimile (newsprint of the Call is unavailable). Clemens’s postscript alluded to the second item (“This ... Massett”) but not to the first; yet his purpose for enclosing the second would not have been intelligible to Mrs. Fairbanks without the first. Stephen C. Massett (1820–98), who called himself “Jeems Pipes of Pipesville,” was a popular California-based entertainer with experience both there and abroad. His usual performance incorporated recitations, anecdotes, impersonations, and songs of his own composition. Shortly after his return from an Asian tour, on 17 May, and probably just before Clemens wrote this letter to Mrs. Fairbanks, the two men were introduced by editor and proprietor George E. Barnes in the offices of the Call (Hart, 264; “Arrival of the ‘New York’ from China and Japan,” San Francisco Alta California, 19 May 68, 1; Massett to SLC, 29 Jan 81, CU-MARK).
MS, Huntington Library, San Marino, Calif. (CSmH, call no. HM 14227). Clemens’s actual enclosures do not survive, but they probably were: (1) Clemens’s sketch “Important to Whom It May Concern,” from the San Francisco News Letter and California Advertiser, 13 June 68, 8 (SLC 1868), reproduced in photographic facsimile from newsprint now in the San Francisco Public Library (CSf); and (2) a letter by Stephen C. Massett (Jeems Pipes) from the San Francisco Morning Call, 17 June 68, 1, which is reproduced in a line-for-line reprint because a fully legible photographic facsimile of the Call typesetting is not now feasible.
L2 , 221–231; MTMF , 28–32, without the enclosures. Of the two enclosures, SLC 1868 was widely and frequently reprinted by contemporary newspapers; the Massett letter was not reprinted, as far as is known.
see Huntington Library, p. 512.
More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.