and faces, and of making
himself agreeable to his passengers. As a politician this had been
valuable to him, and he kept his arts in good condition by practice. By
the time he had been Governor a year, he had shaken hands with every
human being in the Territory of Nevada, and after that he always knew
these people instantly at sight and could call them by name. The whole
population, of 20,000 persons, were his personal friends, and he could
do anything he chose to do and count upon their being contented with it.
Whenever he was absent from the Territory--which was generally--Orion
served his office in his place, as Acting Governor, a title which was
soon and easily shortened to "Governor." He recklessly built and
furnished a house at a cost of twelve thousand dollars, and there was no
other house in the sage-brush capital that could approach this property
for style and cost.

When Governor Nye's four-year term was drawing to a close, the mystery
of why he had ever consented to leave the great State of New York and
help inhabit that jack-rabbit desert was solved: he had gone out there
in order to become a United States Senator. All that was now necessary
was to turn the Territory into a State. He did it without any
difficulty. That undeveloped country and that sparse population were not
well fitted for the heavy burden of a State Government, but no matter,
the people were willing to have the change, and so the Governor's game
was made.

Orion's game was made too, apparently, for he was as popular because of
his honesty as the Governor was for more substantial reasons; but at the
critical moment the inborn capriciousness of his character rose up
without warning, and disaster followed.

MARK TWAIN.

(_To be Continued._)

NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW

No. DCIX.

FEBRUARY 15, 1907.

CHAPTERS FROM MY AUTOBIOGRAPHY.--XII.

BY MARK TWAIN.

[Sidenote: (1864-5.)]

_Orion Clemens--resumed._

[_Dictated April 5, 1906._] There were several candidates for all the
offices in the gift of the new State of Nevada save two--United States
Senator, and Secretary of State. Nye was certain to get a Senatorship,
and Orion was so sure to get the Secretaryship that no one but him was
named for that office. But he was hit with one of his spasms of virtue
on the very day that the Republican party was to make its nominations in
the Convention, and refus