The Project Gutenberg EBook of Life On The Mississippi, Part 7.
by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

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Title: Life On The Mississippi, Part 7.

Author: Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

Release Date: July 10, 2004 [EBook #8477]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIFE ON THE MISSISSIPPI, PART 7. ***

Produced by David Widger

LIFE ON THE MISSISSIPPI

BY MARK TWAIN

Part 7.

Chapter 31 A Thumb-print and What Came of It

WE were approaching Napoleon, Arkansas. So I began to think about my
errand there. Time, noonday; and bright and sunny. This was bad--not
best, anyway; for mine was not (preferably) a noonday kind of errand.
The more I thought, the more that fact pushed itself upon me--now in one
form, now in another. Finally, it took the form of a distinct question:
is it good common sense to do the errand in daytime, when, by a little
sacrifice of comfort and inclination, you can have night for it, and no
inquisitive eyes around. This settled it. Plain question and plain
answer make the shortest road out of most perplexities.

I got my friends into my stateroom, and said I was sorry to create
annoyance and disappointment, but that upon reflection it really seemed
best that we put our luggage ashore and stop over at Napoleon. Their
disapproval was prompt and loud; their language mutinous. Their main
argument was one which has always been the first to come to the surface,
in such cases, since the beginning of time: 'But you decided and AGREED
to stick to this boat, etc.; as if, having determined to do an unwise
thing, one is thereby bound to go ahead and make TWO unwise things of
it, by carrying out that determination.

I tried various mollifying tactics upon them, with reasonably good
success: under which encouragement, I increased my efforts; and, to show
them that I had not created this annoying errand, and was in no way to
blame for it, I presently drifted into its history--substantially as
follows:

Toward the end of last year, I spent a few months in Munich, Bavaria. In
November I was living in Fraulein Dahlweine