oint the
Members myself, and they can't help themselves, because I don't allow
them to vote on their own appointment and I don't allow them to resign!
They are all friends whom I have never seen (save one), but who have
written friendly letters to me.

By the laws of my Club there can be only one Member in each country, and
there can be no male Member but myself. Some day I may admit males,
but I don't know--they are capricious and inharmonious, and their ways
provoke me a good deal. It is a matter which the Club shall decide.

I have made four appointments in the past three or four months: You
as Member for France, a young Highland girl as Member for Scotland, a
Mohammedan girl as Member for Bengal, and a dear and bright young
niece of mine as Member for the United States--for I do not represent a
country myself, but am merely Member at Large for the Human Race.

You must not try to resign, for the laws of the Club do not allow that.
You must console yourself by remembering that you are in the best of
company; that nobody knows of your membership except myself--that no
Member knows another's name, but only her country; that no taxes are
levied and no meetings held (but how dearly I should like to attend
one!).

One of my Members is a Princess of a royal house, another is the
daughter of a village book-seller on the continent of Europe. For the
only qualification for Membership is intellect and the spirit of good
will; other distinctions, hereditary or acquired, do not count.

May I send you the Constitution and Laws of the Club? I shall be so
pleased if I may. It is a document which one of my daughters typewrites
for me when I need one for a new Member, and she would give her eyebrows
to know what it is all about, but I strangle her curiosity by saying:
"There are much cheaper typewriters than you are, my dear, and if
you try to pry into the sacred mysteries of this Club one of your
prosperities will perish sure."

My favorite? It is "Joan of Arc." My next is "Huckleberry Finn," but the
family's next is "The Prince and the Pauper." (Yes, you are right--I
am a moralist in disguise; it gets me into heaps of trouble when I go
thrashing around in political questions.)

I wish you every good fortune and happiness and I thank you so much for
your letter.

Sincerely yours,
S. L. CLEMENS.

Early in the year Clemens paid a visit to Twichell in Hartford, and