in the land which majestic ignorance
and incapacity, coupled with purity of heart, could fill, I would run
for it. This naturally reminds me of Bret Harte--but let him pass.

We propose to leave here for New York Oct. 21, reaching Hartford 24th or
25th. If, upon reflection, you Howellses find, you can stop over here
on your way, I wish you would do it, and telegraph me. Getting pretty
hungry to see you. I had an idea that this was your shortest way home,
but like as not my geography is crippled again--it usually is.

Yrs ever
MARK.

The "Reunion of the Great Commanders," mentioned in the foregoing,
was a welcome to General Grant after his journey around the world.
Grant's trip had been one continuous ovation--a triumphal march.
In '79 most of his old commanders were still alive, and they had
planned to assemble in Chicago to do him honor. A Presidential year
was coming on, but if there was anything political in the project
there were no surface indications. Mark Twain, once a Confederate
soldier, had long since been completely "desouthernized"--at least
to the point where he felt that the sight of old comrades paying
tribute to the Union commander would stir his blood as perhaps it
had not been stirred, even in that earlier time, when that same
commander had chased him through the Missouri swamps. Grant,
indeed, had long since become a hero to Mark Twain, though it is
highly unlikely that Clemens favored the idea of a third term. Some
days following the preceding letter an invitation came for him to be
present at the Chicago reunion; but by this time he had decided not
to go. The letter he wrote has been preserved.

*****

To Gen. William E. Strong, in Chicago:

FARMINGTON AVENUE, HARTFORD.

Oct. 28, 1879.

GEN. WM. E. STRONG, CH'M, AND GENTLEMEN OF THE COMMITTEE:

I have been hoping during several weeks that it might be my good
fortune to receive an invitation to be present on that great occasion in
Chicago; but now that my desire is accomplished my business matters have
so shaped themselves as to bar me from being so far from home in the
first half of November. It is with supreme regret that I lost this
chance, for I have not had a thorough stirr