h imagination and wit and a natural
gift for terms. That Samuel Clemens maintained his promise as to drink
and cards during those apprentice days is something worth remembering;
and if he did not always restrict his profanity to moments of severe
pressure or sift the quality of his wit, we may also remember that he
was an extreme example of a human being, in that formative stage which
gathers all as grist, later to refine it for the uses and delights of
men.

He acquired a vast knowledge of human character. He says:

In that brief, sharp schooling I got personally and familiarly
acquainted with all the different types of human nature that are to
be found in fiction, biography, or history. When I find a well-
drawn character in fiction or biography, I generally take a warm
personal interest in him, for the reason that I have, known him
before--met him on the river.

Undoubtedly the river was a great school for the study of life's broader
philosophies and humors: philosophies that avoid vague circumlocution
and aim at direct and sure results; humors of the rugged and vigorous
sort that in Europe are known as "American" and in America are known as
"Western." Let us be thankful that Mark Twain's school was no less than
it was--and no more.

The demands of the Missouri River trade took Horace Bixby away from the
Mississippi, somewhat later, and he consigned his pupil, according to
custom, to another pilot--it is not certain, now, to just which pilot,
but probably to Zeb Leavenworth or Beck Jolly, of the John J. Roe. The
Roe was a freight-boat, "as slow as an island and as comfortable as
a farm." In fact, the Roe was owned and conducted by farmers, and Sam
Clemens thought if John Quarles's farm could be set afloat it
would greatly resemble that craft in the matter of good-fellowship,
hospitality, and speed. It was said of her that up-stream she could even
beat an island, though down-stream she could never quite overtake the
current, but was a "love of a steamboat" nevertheless. The Roe was not
licensed to carry passengers, but she always had a dozen "family guests"
aboard, and there was a big boiler-deck for dancing and moonlight
frolics, also a piano in the cabin. The young pilot sometimes played on
the piano and sang to his music songs relating to the "grasshopper on
the sweet-potato vine," or to an old horse by the name of Methusalem:

Took him down and sold him in Jerusalem,