rrence in the effort there is no memory of it now. Clemens
abandoned the original idea, but remained one of the most persistent and
influential advocates of copyright betterment, and lived to see most of
his dream fulfilled.--[For the petition concerning copyright term in the
United States, see Sketches New and Old. For the petition concerning
international copyright and related matters, see Appendix N, at the end
of last volume.]

CIII

"ATLANTIC" DAYS

It was about this period that Mark Twain began to exhibit openly his more
serious side; that is to say his advocacy of public reforms. His paper
on "Universal Suffrage" had sounded a first note, and his copyright
petitions were of the same spirit. In later years he used to say that he
had always felt it was his mission to teach, to carry the banner of moral
reconstruction, and here at forty we find him furnishing evidences of
this inclination. In the Atlantic for October, 1875, there was published
an unsigned three-page article entitled, "The Curious Republic of
Gondour." In this article was developed the idea that the voting
privilege should be estimated not by the individuals, but by their
intellectual qualifications. The republic of Gondour was a Utopia, where
this plan had been established:

It was an odd idea and ingenious. You must understand the
constitution gave every man a vote; therefore that vote was a vested
right, and could not be taken away. But the constitution did not
say that certain individuals might not be given two votes or ten.
So an amendatory clause was inserted in a quiet way, a clause which
authorized the enlargement of the suffrage in certain cases to be
specified by statute....

The victory was complete. The new law was framed and passed. Under
it every citizen, howsoever poor or ignorant, possessed one vote, so
universal suffrage still reigned; but if a man possessed a good
common-school education and no money he had two votes, a high-school
education gave him four; if he had property, likewise, to the value
of three thousand sacos he wielded one more vote; for every fifty
thousand sacos a man added to his property, he was entitled to
another vote; a University education entitled a man to nine votes,
even though he owned no property.

The author goes on to show the beneficent results of this enaction; how
the country was benefited and glorified by this stimulus towar