Eds. Tribune: As Mark Twain, with characteristic intrepidity—I won’t say impudence—dares to call me “thief,” I beg the favor of a small space in your journal to ask the “popular author” upon what he bases his accusation. That Mark Twain, (Samuel L. Clemens) assisted by Charles Warner Dudley, wrote the novel, “The Gilded Age,” I am well aware; that the novel has been widely read I am well aware; and I am also aware that there are numbers of people who, popular as Mark Twain is, do not place him on the same level with the late lamented Charles Dickens, although he has, with most praiseworthy perseverance, endeavored, especially in the character of Colonel Sellers, to follow the style of the immortal novelist as closely as possible. It has been decided in the English courts that the author of a novel is powerless to prevent any one dramatizing his work. The judges held that to restrain a dramatist, it was necessary, on the part of the novelist to prove damage; and decided that a man dramatizing a novel not only did not commit damage, but considerably enhanced the value of the novel by giving it a wide-spread reputation. When I dramatized Mark Twain’s “Gilded Age” I knew nothing whatever of the act of Congress passed in 1870, giving to the novelist the exclusive right to dramatize, as at the time I had only been a resident of this country for a few months; consequently, in attempting to place my drama on the stage, I had no idea of robbing Mark Twain of an infinitesimal portion of the fruits of his intellect. Under the circumstances, Mark Twain has been perfectly justified in applying for an injunction, and had I known of the existence of the law of 1870, there would have been no occasion for Mark Twain to apply for it, as I should never have dreamt of attempting to play the drama. But Mark Twain is far from being justified in applying the term “thief” to a man without ascertaining, beyond a doubt, whether he was correct or not in so doing. When Mr. Twain talks about “thieving,” it is necessary that Willie Gill should remind him, that, but for Dickens’ happy idea in conceiving the character of Wilkins Micawber, Mark Twain would not now be reaping a golden harvest out of the character of Col. Sellers, whom he has put forth as an original conception of his own. I am sorry that I have, in the smallest degree, infringed upon the rights of Mark Twain, and I am still more sorry to find that a gentleman of such vast conceptive power as Mr. Twain possesses, evidenced in the character of Col. Sellers, could not have hit upon a more novel and original expression of opprobrium than that of “thief.”

Willie Gill.

Salt Lake, Feb. 9th, 1875.