the holidays, and later wrote back an affectionate
letter to Mark Twain.

"I shall always remember Virginia as a bright spot in my existence," he
said, "as all others must, or rather, cannot be, as it were."

With Artemus Ward's encouragement, Mark Twain now began sending work
eastward. The "New York Sunday Mercury" published one, possibly more, of
his sketches, but they were not in his best vein, and made little
impression. He may have been too busy for outside work, for the
legislative session of 1864 was just beginning. Furthermore, he had been
chosen governor of the "Third House," a mock legislature, organized for
one session, to be held as a church benefit. The "governor" was to
deliver a message, which meant that he was to burlesque from the platform
all public officials and personages, from the real governor down.

With the exception of a short talk he had once given at a printer's
dinner in Keokuk, it was Mark Twain's first appearance as a speaker, and
the beginning of a lifelong series of triumphs on the platform. The
building was packed--the aisles full. The audience was ready for fun,
and he gave it to them. Nobody escaped ridicule; from beginning to end
the house was a storm of laughter and applause.

Not a word of this first address of Mark Twain's has been preserved, but
those who heard it always spoke of it as the greatest effort of his life,
as to them it seemed, no doubt.

For his Third House address, Clemens was presented with a gold watch,
inscribed "To Governor Mark Twain." Everywhere, now, he was pointed out
as a distinguished figure, and his quaint remarks were quoted. Few of
these sayings are remembered to-day, though occasionally one is still
unforgotten. At a party one night, being urged to make a conundrum, he
said:

"Well, why am I like the Pacific Ocean?"

Several guesses were made, but he shook his head. Some one said:

"We give it up. Tell us, Mark, why are you like the Pacific Ocean?"

"I--don't--know," he drawled. "I was just--asking for information."

The governor of Nevada was generally absent, and Orion Clemens was
executive head of the territory. His wife, who had joined him in Carson
City, was social head of the little capital, and Brother Sam, with his
new distinction and now once more something of a dandy in dress, was
society's chief ornament--a great change, certainly, from the early
months of his arrival less than three years before.

It was near the end of May, 1864