ew pipe irritates the throat. No
corncob pipe is fit for anything until it has been used at least a
fortnight."

"How do you break in a pipe, then?" asked Bok.

"That's the trick," answered Mark Twain. "I get a cheap man--a man who
doesn't amount to much, anyhow: who would be as well, or better,
dead--and pay him a dollar to break in the pipe for me. I get him to
smoke the pipe for a couple of weeks, then put in a new stem, and
continue operations as long as the pipe holds together."

Bok's newspaper syndicate work had brought him into contact with Fanny
Davenport, then at the zenith of her career as an actress. Miss
Davenport, or Mrs. Melbourne McDowell as she was in private life, had
never written for print; but Bok, seeing that she had something to say
about her art and the ability to say it, induced her to write for the
newspapers through his syndicate. The actress was overjoyed to have
revealed to her a hitherto unsuspected gift; Bok published her articles
successfully, and gave her a publicity that her press agent had never
dreamed of. Miss Davenport became interested in the young publisher, and
after watching the methods which he employed in successfully publishing
her writings, decided to try to obtain his services as her assistant
manager. She broached the subject, offered him a five years' contract
for forty weeks' service, with a minimum of fifteen weeks each year to
spend in or near New York, at a salary, for the first year, of three
thousand dollars, increasing annually until the fifth year, when he was
to receive sixty-four hundred dollars.

Bok was attracted to the work: he had never seen the United States, was
anxious to do so, and looked upon the chance as a good opportunity. Miss
Davenport had the contract made out, executed it, and then, in high
glee, Bok took it home to show it to his mother. He had reckoned without
question upon her approval, only to meet with an immediate and decided
negative to the proposition as a whole, general and specific. She argued
that the theatrical business was not for him; and she saw ahead and
pointed out so strongly the mistake he was making that he sought Miss
Davenport the next day and told her of his mother's stand. The actress
suggested that she see the mother; she did, that day, and she came away
from the interview a wiser if a sadder woman. Miss Davenport frankly
told Bok that with such an instinctive objection as his mother seemed to
have, he was right to fo