have told
her the right way a thousand times, but it does no good, she never
remembers.)

All through this Vienna period (as during several years before and
after) Henry Rogers was in full charge of Mark Twain's American affairs.
Clemens wrote him almost daily, and upon every matter, small or large,
that developed, or seemed likely to develop, in his undertakings. The
complications growing out of the type machine and Webster failures were
endless.--["I hope to goodness I sha'n't get you into any more jobs such
as the type-setter and Webster business and the Bliss-Harper campaigns
have been. Oh, they were sickeners." (Clemens to Rogers, November 15,
1898.)]--The disposal of the manuscripts alone was work for a literary
agent. The consideration of proposed literary, dramatic, and financial
schemes must have required not only thought, but time. Yet Mr. Rogers
comfortably and genially took care of all these things and his own
tremendous affairs besides, and apologized sometimes when he felt,
perhaps, that he had wavered a little in his attention. Clemens once
wrote him:

Oh, dear me, you don't have to excuse yourself for neglecting me;
you are entitled to the highest praise for being so limitlessly
patient and good in bothering with my confused affairs, and pulling
me out of a hole every little while.

It makes me lazy, the way that Steel stock is rising. If I were
lazier--like Rice--nothing could keep me from retiring. But I work
right along, like a poor person. I shall figure up the rise, as the
figures come in, and push up my literary prices accordingly, till I
get my literature up to where nobody can afford it but the family.
(N. B.--Look here, are you charging storage? I am not going to
stand that, you know.) Meantime, I note those encouraging illogical
words of yours about my not worrying because I am to be rich when I
am 68; why didn't you have Cheiro make it 90, so that I could have
plenty of room?

It would be jolly good if some one should succeed in making a play
out of "Is He Dead?"--[Clemens himself had attempted to make a play
out of his story "Is He Dead?" and had forwarded the MS. to Rogers.
Later he wrote: "Put 'Is He Dead?' in the fire. God will bless you.
I too. I started to convince myself that I could write a play, or
couldn't. I'm convinced. Nothing can disturb that conviction."]
--From what I gather from dramatist