s, receptions, and assemblies were not complete without him. The
White Friars' Club and others gave banquets in his honor. He was the
sensation of the day. When he rose to speak on these occasions he was
greeted with wild cheers. Whatever he said they eagerly applauded--too
eagerly sometimes, in the fear that they might be regarded as insensible
to American humor. Other speakers delighted in chaffing him in order to
provoke his retorts. When a speaker humorously referred to his American
habit of carrying a cotton umbrella, his reply that he followed this
custom because a cotton umbrella was the only kind of an umbrella that an
Englishman wouldn't steal, was all over England next day, and regarded as
one of the finest examples of wit since the days of Swift.

The suddenness and completeness of his acceptance by the great ones of
London rather overwhelmed and frightened him made him timid. Joaquin
Miller writes:

He was shy as a girl, although time was already coyly flirting white
flowers at his temples, and could hardly be coaxed to meet the
learned and great who wanted to take him by the hand.

Many came to call on him at his hotel, among them Charles Reade and Canon
Kingsley. Kingsley came twice without finding him; then wrote, asking
for an appointment. Reade invited his assistance on a novel. Indeed, it
was in England that Mark Twain was first made to feel that he had come
into his rightful heritage. Whatever may have been the doubts concerning
him in America, there was no question in England. Howells says:

In England rank, fashion, and culture rejoiced in him. Lord mayors,
lord chief justices, and magnates of many kinds were his hosts; he
was desired in country houses, and his bold genius captivated the
favor of periodicals which spurned the rest of our nation.

After that first visit of Mark Twain's, when Americans in England,
referring to their great statesmen, authors, and the like, naturally
mentioned the names of Seward, Webster, Lowell, or Holmes, the English
comment was likely to be: "Never mind those. We can turn out academic
Sewards by the dozen, and cultured humorists like Lowell and Holmes by
the score. Tell us of Lincoln, Artemus Ward, and Mark Twain. We cannot
match these; they interest us." And it was true. History could not
match them, for they were unique.

Clemens would have been more than human if in time he had not realized
the fuller meaning of this triumph, and