e a humility too. I argued that the book would have an enormous sale,
and that out of my experience I could save him from making unwise
contracts with publishers, and would have the contract arranged in such a
way that they could not swindle him, but he said he had no necessity for
any addition to his income. Of course he could not foresee that he was
camping on a volcano; that as Ward's partner he was a ruined man even
then, and of course I had no suspicion that in four years from that time
I would become his publisher. He would not agree to write his memoirs.
He only said that some day he would make very full notes and leave them
behind him, and then if his children chose to make them into a book they
could do so. We came away then. He fulfilled his promise entirely
concerning Howells's father, who held his office until he resigned of his
own accord."

CXXXVI

"THE PRINCE AND THE PAUPER"

During the summer absence alterations were made in the Hartford home,
with extensive decorations by Tiffany. The work was not completed when
the family returned. Clemens wrote to Charles Warren Stoddard, then in
the Sandwich Islands, that the place was full of carpenters and
decorators, whereas what they really needed was "an incendiary."

If the house would only burn down we would pack up the cubs and fly to
the isles of the blest, and shut ourselves up in the healing solitudes of
the crater of Haleakala and get a good rest, for the mails do not intrude
there, nor yet the telephone and the telegraph; and after resting we
would come down the mountain a piece and board with a godly,
breech-clouted native, and eat poi and dirt, and give thanks to whom all
thanks belong for these privileges, and never housekeep any more.

They had acquired more ground. One morning in the spring Mark Twain had
looked out of his window just in time to see a man lift an ax to cut down
a tree on the lot which lay between his own and that of his neighbor. He
had heard that a house was to be built there; altogether too close to him
for comfort and privacy. Leaning out of the window he called sonorously,
"Woodman, spare that tree!" Then he hurried down, obtained a stay of
proceedings, and without delay purchased the lot from the next-door
neighbor who owned it, acquiring thereby one hundred feet of extra ground
and a greenhouse which occupied it. It was a costly purchase; the owner
knew he could demand his own price; he asked and received twelve thou