ant panoramic march. In time he
would write technically better. He would avoid solecism, he would become
a greater master of vocabulary and phrase, but in all the years ahead he
would never match the lambent bloom and spontaneity of those fresh, first
impressions of Mediterranean lands and seas. No need to mention the
humor, the burlesque, the fearless, unrestrained ridicule of old masters
and of sacred relics, so called. These we have kept familiar with much
repetition. Only, the humor had grown more subtle, more restrained; the
burlesque had become impersonal and harmless, the ridicule so frank and
good-natured, that even the old masters themselves might have enjoyed it,
while the most devoted churchman, unless blinded by bigotry, would find
in it satisfaction, rather than sacrilege.

The final letter was written for the New York Herald after the arrival,
and was altogether unlike those that preceded it. Gaily satirical and
personal--inclusively so--it might better have been left unwritten, for
it would seem to have given needless offense to a number of goodly
people, whose chief sin was the sedateness of years. However, it is all
past now, and those who were old then, and perhaps queer and pious and
stingy, do not mind any more, and those who were young and frivolous have
all grown old too, and most of them have set out on the still farther
voyage. Somewhere, it may be, they gather, now; and then, and lightly,
tenderly recall their old-time journeying.

LXIII

IN WASHINGTON--A PUBLISHING PROPOSITION

Clemens remained but one day in New York. Senator Stewart had written,
about the time of the departure of the Quaker City, offering him the
position of private secretary--a position which was to give him leisure
for literary work, with a supporting salary as well. Stewart no doubt
thought it would be considerably to his advantage to have the brilliant
writer and lecturer attached to his political establishment, and Clemens
likewise saw possibilities in the arrangement. From Naples, in August,
he had written accepting Stewart's offer; he lost no time now in
discussing the matter in person.--[In a letter home, August 9th, he
referred to the arrangement: "I wrote to Bill Stewart to-day accepting
his private secretaryship in Washington, next winter."]

There seems to have been little difficulty in concluding the arrangement.
When Clemens had been in Washington a week we find him writing:

DEAR FOLKS, Tired an