graveyards called a "Fair paper," and so I have doubtless lost the
knack of it somewhat; still I have done the best I could for you.

This was from a burning heart and well deserved. One may almost
regret that he did not send it.

Once he received a letter intended for one Samuel Clements, of Elma, New
York, announcing that the said Clements's pension had been allowed. But
this was amusing. When Clemens had forwarded the notice to its proper
destination he could not resist sending this comment to the commissioner
at Washington:

DEAR SIR,--I have not applied for a pension. I have often wanted a
pension--often--ever so often--I may say, but in as much as the only
military service I performed during the war was in the Confederate
army, I have always felt a delicacy about asking you for it.
However, since you have suggested the thing yourself, I feel
strengthened. I haven't any very pensionable diseases myself, but I
can furnish a substitute--a man who is just simply a chaos, a museum
of all the different kinds of aches and pains, fractures,
dislocations and malformations there are; a man who would regard
"rheumatism and sore eyes" as mere recreation and refreshment after
the serious occupations of his day. If you grant me the pension,
dear sir, please hand it to General Jos. Hawley, United States
Senator--I mean hand him the certificate, not the money, and he will
forward it to me. You will observe by this postal-card which I
inclose that he takes a friendly interest in the matter. He thinks
I've already got the pension, whereas I've only got the rheumatism;
but didn't want that--I had that before. I wish it were catching. I
know a man that I would load up with it pretty early. Lord, but we
all feel that way sometimes. I've seen the day when but never mind
that; you may be busy; just hand it to Hawley--the certificate, you
understand, is not transferable.

Clemens was in good standing at Washington during the Cleveland
administration, and many letters came, asking him to use his influence
with the President to obtain this or that favor. He always declined,
though once--a few years later, in Europe--when he learned that Frank
Mason, consul-general at Frankfort, was about to be displaced, Clemens,
of his own accord, wrote to Baby Ruth Cleveland about it.

MY DEAR RUTH, I belong to the Mugwumps, and one of the most sacre