inal return of proofs, together with the date of publication,
preclude the possibility of such a circumstance. At some period of his
life he doubtless sent, or contemplated sending, such a message, and
this fact, through some curious psychology, became confused in his mind
with the first edition of The Innocents Abroad.]

LXXI. THE GREAT BOOK OF TRAVEL.

'The Innocents Abroad' was a success from the start. The machinery for
its sale and delivery was in full swing by August 1, and five thousand
one hundred and seventy copies were disposed of that month--a number
that had increased to more than thirty-one thousand by the first of the
year. It was a book of travel; its lowest price was three and a half
dollars. No such record had been made by a book of that description;
none has equaled it since.--[One must recall that this was the record
only up to 1910. D.W.]

If Mark Twain was not already famous, he was unquestionably famous now.
As the author of The New Pilgrim's Progress he was swept into the domain
of letters as one riding at the head of a cavalcade--doors and windows
wide with welcome and jubilant with applause. Newspapers chorused their
enthusiasm; the public voiced universal approval; only a few of the more
cultured critics seemed hesitant and doubtful.

They applauded--most of them--but with reservation. Doctor Holland
regarded Mark Twain as a mere fun maker of ephemeral popularity, and was
not altogether pleasant in his dictum. Doctor Holmes, in a letter to the
author, speaks of the "frequently quaint and amusing conceits," but
does not find it in his heart to refer to the book as literature. It was
naturally difficult for the East to concede a serious value to one
who approached his subject with such militant aboriginality, and
occasionally wrote "those kind." William Dean Howells reviewed the book
in the Atlantic, which was of itself a distinction, whether the review
was favorable or otherwise. It was favorable on the whole, favorable
to the humor of the book, its "delicious impudence," the charm of its
good-natured irony. The review closed:

It is no business of ours to fix his rank among the humorists
California has given us, but we think he is, in an entirely
different way from all the others, quite worthy of the company of
the best.

This is praise, but not of an intemperate sort, nor very inclusive. The
descriptive, the poetic, the more pretentious phases of the book did not