Complete Letters of Mark Twain

In the next letter and the one following it we get a hint of an episode, or rather of two incidents which he combined into an episode in Roughing It. The story as told in that book is an account of what might have happened, rather than history. There was never really any money in the “blind lead” of the Wide West claim, except that which was sunk in it by unfortunate investors. Only extracts from these letters are given. The other portions are irrelevant and of slight value.

Extract from a letter to Orion Clemens, in Carson City:

1862.

Two or three of the old “Salina” company entered our hole on the Monitor yesterday morning, before our men got there, and took possession, armed with revolvers. And according to the d – d laws of this forever d – d country, nothing but the District Court (and there ain’t any) can touch the matter, unless it assumes the shape of an infernal humbug which they call “forcible entry and detainer,” and in order to bring that about, you must compel the jumpers to use personal violence toward you! We went up and demanded possession, and they refused. Said they were in the hole, armed and meant to die for it, if necessary.

I got in with them, and again demanded possession. They said I might stay in it as long as I pleased, and work but they would do the same. I asked one of our company to take my place in the hole, while I went to consult a lawyer. He did so. The lawyer said it was no go. They must offer some “force.”

Our boys will try to be there first in the morning – in which case they may get possession and keep it. Now you understand the shooting scrape in which Gebhart was killed the other day. The Clemens Company – all of us – hate to resort to arms in this matter, and it will not be done until it becomes a forced hand – but I think that will be the end of it, never-the-less.

The mine relocated in this letter was not the “Wide West,” but it furnished the proper incident. The only mention of the “Wide West” is found in a letter written in July.

Extract from a letter to Orion Clemens, in Carson City: 1862

If I do not forget it, I will send you, per next mail, a pinch of decom. (decomposed rock) which I pinched with thumb and finger from “Wide West” ledge awhile ago. Raish and I have secured 200 out of a 400 ft. in it, which perhaps (the ledge, I mean) is a spur from the W. W. – our shaft is about 100 ft. from the W. W. shaft. In order to get in, we agreed to sink 30 ft. We have sub-let to another man for 50 ft., and we pay for powder and sharpening tools.

The “Wide West” claim was forfeited, but there is no evidence to show that Clemens and his partners were ever, except in fiction, “millionaires for ten days.” The background, the local color, and the possibilities are all real enough, but Mark Twain’s aim in this, as in most of his other reminiscent writing, was to arrange and adapt his facts to the needs of a good story.

The letters of this summer (1862) most of them bear evidence of waning confidence in mining as a source of fortune – the miner has now little faith in his own judgment, and none at all in that of his brother, who was without practical experience.

Letter to Orion Clemens, in Carson City:

Esmeralda, Thursday.

My dear Bro., – Yours of the 17th, per express, just received. Part of it pleased me exceedingly, and part of it didn’t. Concerning the letter, for instance: You have promised me that you would leave all mining matters, and everything involving an outlay of money, in my hands.

Sending a man fooling around the country after ledges, for God’s sake! when there are hundreds of feet of them under my nose here, begging for owners, free of charge. I don’t want any more feet, and I won’t touch another foot – so you see, Orion, as far as any ledges of Perry’s are concerned, (or any other except what I examine first with my own eyes,) I freely yield my right to share ownership with you.

The balance of your letter, I say, pleases me exceedingly. Especially that about the H. and D. being worth from $30 to $50 in Cal. It pleases me because, if the ledges prove to be worthless, it will be a pleasant reflection to know that others were beaten worse than ourselves. Raish sold a man 30 feet, yesterday, at $20 a foot, although I was present at the sale, and told the man the ground wasn’t worth a d – n. He said he had been hankering after a few feet in the H. and D. for a long time, and he had got them at last, and he couldn’t help thinking he had secured a good thing. We went and looked at the ledges, and both of them acknowledged that there was nothing in them but good “indications.” Yet the owners in the H. and D. will part with anything else sooner than with feet in these ledges. Well, the work goes slowly – very slowly on, in the tunnel, and we’ll strike it some day. But – if we “strike it rich,”—I’ve lost my guess, that’s all. I expect that the way it got so high in Cal. was, that Raish’s brother, over there was offered $750.00 for 20 feet of it, and he refused…..

Couldn’t go on the hill today. It snowed. It always snows here, I expect.

Don’t you suppose they have pretty much quit writing, at home?

When you receive your next 1/4 yr’s salary, don’t send any of it here until after you have told me you have got it. Remember this. I am afraid of that H. and D.

They have struck the ledge in the Live Yankee tunnel, and I told the President, Mr. Allen, that it wasn’t as good as the croppings. He said that was true enough, but they would hang to it until it did prove rich. He is much of a gentleman, that man Allen.

And ask Gaslerie why the devil he don’t send along my commission as Deputy Sheriff. The fact of my being in California, and out of his country, wouldn’t amount to a d – n with me, in the performance of my official duties.

I have nothing to report, at present, except that I shall find out all I want to know about this locality before I leave it.

How do the Records pay?

Yr. Bro.

Sam.

In one of the foregoing letters – the one dated May 11 there is a reference to the writer’s “Enterprise Letters.” Sometimes, during idle days in the camp, the miner had followed old literary impulses and written an occasional burlesque sketch, which he had signed “Josh,” and sent to the Territorial Enterprise, at Virginia City.[7] The rough, vigorous humor of these had attracted some attention, and Orion, pleased with any measure of success that might come to his brother, had allowed the authorship of them to become known. When, in July, the financial situation became desperate, the Esmeralda miner was moved to turn to literature for relief. But we will let him present the situation himself.

To Orion Clemens, in Carson City:

Esmeralda, July 23d, 1862.

My dear Bro., – No, I don’t own a foot in the “Johnson” ledge – I will tell the story some day in a more intelligible manner than Tom has told it. You needn’t take the trouble to deny Tom’s version, though. I own 25 feet (1-16) of the 1st east ex. on it – and Johnson himself has contracted to find the ledge for 100 feet. Contract signed yesterday. But as the ledge will be difficult to find he is allowed six months to find it in. An eighteenth of the Ophir was a fortune to John D. Winters-and the Ophir can’t beat the Johnson any…..

My debts are greater than I thought for; I bought $25 worth of clothing, and sent $25 to Higbie, in the cement diggings. I owe about $45 or $50, and have got about $45 in my pocket. But how in the h – l I am going to live on something over $100 until October or November, is singular. The fact is, I must have something to do, and that shortly, too…..

Now write to the Sacramento Union folks, or to Marsh, and tell them I’ll write as many letters a week as they want, for $10 a week – my board must be paid. Tell them I have corresponded with the N. Orleans Crescent, and other papers – and the Enterprise. California is full of people who have interests here, and it’s d – d seldom they hear from this country. I can’t write a specimen letter – now, at any rate – I’d rather undertake to write a Greek poem. Tell ’em the mail and express leave three times a week, and it costs from 25 to 50 cents to send letters by the blasted express. If they want letters from here, who’ll run from morning till night collecting materials cheaper. I’ll write a short letter twice a week, for the present, for the “Age,” for $5 per week. Now it has been a long time since I couldn’t make my own living, and it shall be a long time before I loaf another year…..

If I get the other 25 feet in the Johnson ex., I shan’t care a d – n. I’ll be willing to curse awhile and wait. And if I can’t move the bowels of those hills this fall, I will come up and clerk for you until I get money enough to go over the mountains for the winter.

Yr. Bro.

Sam.

The Territorial Enterprise at Virginia City was at this time owned by Joseph T. Goodman, who had bought it on the eve of the great Comstock silver-mining boom, and from a struggling, starving sheet had converted it into one of the most important – certainly the most picturesque-papers on the coast. The sketches which the Esmeralda miner had written over the name of “Josh” fitted into it exactly, and when a young man named Barstow, in the business office, urged Goodman to invite “Josh” to join their staff, the Enterprise owner readily fell in with the idea. Among a lot of mining matters of no special interest, Clemens, July 30th, wrote his brother: “Barstow has offered me the post as local reporter for the Enterprise at $25 a week, and I have written him that I will let him know next mail, if possible.”

In Roughing It we are told that the miner eagerly accepted the proposition to come to Virginia City, but the letters tell a different story. Mark Twain was never one to abandon any undertaking easily. His unwillingness to surrender in a lost cause would cost him more than one fortune in the years to come. A week following the date of the foregoing he was still undecided.

To Orion Clemens, in Carson City:

Esmeralda, Aug. 7, 1862.

My dear Bro, – Barstow wrote that if I wanted the place I could have it. I wrote him that I guessed I would take it, and asked him how long before I must come up there. I have not heard from him since.

Now, I shall leave at mid-night tonight, alone and on foot for a walk of 60 or 70 miles through a totally uninhabited country, and it is barely possible that mail facilities may prove infernally “slow” during the few weeks I expect to spend out there. But do you write Barstow that I have left here for a week or so, and in case he should want me he must write me here, or let me know through you.

The Contractors say they will strike the Fresno next week. After fooling with those assayers a week, they concluded not to buy “Mr. Flower” at $50, although they would have given five times the sum for it four months ago. So I have made out a deed for one half of all Johnny’s ground and acknowledged and left in judge F. K. Becktel’s hands, and if judge Turner wants it he must write to Becktel and pay him his Notary fee of $1.50. I would have paid that fee myself, but I want money now as I leave town tonight. However, if you think it isn’t right, you can pay the fee to judge Turner yourself.

Hang to your money now. I may want some when I get back…..

See that you keep out of debt – to anybody. Bully for B.! Write him that I would write him myself, but I am to take a walk tonight and haven’t time. Tell him to bring his family out with him. He can rely upon what I say – and I say the land has lost its ancient desolate appearance; the rose and the oleander have taken the place of the departed sage-bush; a rich black loam, garnished with moss, and flowers, and the greenest of grass, smiles to Heaven from the vanished sand-plains; the “endless snows” have all disappeared, and in their stead, or to repay us for their loss, the mountains rear their billowy heads aloft, crowned with a fadeless and eternal verdure; birds, and fountains, and trees-tropical bees – everywhere! – and the poet dreamt of Nevada when he wrote:

“and Sharon waves, in solemn praise,Her silent groves of palm.”

and today the royal Raven listens in a dreamy stupor to the songs of the thrush and the nightingale and the canary – and shudders when the gaudy-plumaged birds of the distant South sweep by him to the orange groves of Carson. Tell him he wouldn’t recognize the d – d country. He should bring his family by all means.

I intended to write home, but I haven’t done it.

Yr. Bro.

Sam.

In this letter we realize that he had gone into the wilderness to reflect – to get a perspective on the situation. He was a great walker in those days, and sometimes with Higbie, sometimes alone, made long excursions. One such is recorded in Roughing It, the trip to Mono Lake. We have no means of knowing where his seventy-mile tour led him now, but it is clear that he still had not reached a decision on his return. Indeed, we gather that he is inclined to keep up the battle among the barren Esmeralda hills.

Last mining letter; written to Mrs. Moffett, in St. Louis:

Esmeralda, Cal., Aug. 15, 1862.

My dear sister, – I mailed a letter to you and Ma this morning, but since then I have received yours to Orion and me. Therefore, I must answer right away, else I may leave town without doing it at all. What in thunder are pilot’s wages to me? which question, I beg humbly to observe, is of a general nature, and not discharged particularly at you. But it is singular, isn’t it, that such a matter should interest Orion, when it is of no earthly consequence to me? I never have once thought of returning home to go on the river again, and I never expect to do any more piloting at any price. My livelihood must be made in this country – and if I have to wait longer than I expected, let it be so – I have no fear of failure. You know I have extravagant hopes, for Orion tells you everything which he ought to keep to himself – but it’s his nature to do that sort of thing, and I let him alone. I did think for awhile of going home this fall – but when I found that that was and had been the cherished intention and the darling aspiration every year, of these old care-worn Californians for twelve weary years – I felt a little uncomfortable, but I stole a march on Disappointment and said I would not go home this fall. I will spend the winter in San Francisco, if possible. Do not tell any one that I had any idea of piloting again at present – for it is all a mistake. This country suits me, and – it shall suit me, whether or no….

Dan Twing and I and Dan’s dog, “cabin” together – and will continue to do so for awhile – until I leave for—

The mansion is 10x12, with a “domestic” roof. Yesterday it rained – the first shower for five months. “Domestic,” it appears to me, is not water-proof. We went outside to keep from getting wet. Dan makes the bed when it is his turn to do it – and when it is my turn, I don’t, you know. The dog is not a good hunter, and he isn’t worth shucks to watch – but he scratches up the dirt floor of the cabin, and catches flies, and makes himself generally useful in the way of washing dishes. Dan gets up first in the morning and makes a fire – and I get up last and sit by it, while he cooks breakfast. We have a cold lunch at noon, and I cook supper – very much against my will. However, one must have one good meal a day, and if I were to live on Dan’s abominable cookery, I should lose my appetite, you know. Dan attended Dr. Chorpenning’s funeral yesterday, and he felt as though he ought to wear a white shirt – and we had a jolly good time finding such an article. We turned over all our traps, and he found one at last – but I shall always think it was suffering from yellow fever. He also found an old black coat, greasy, and wrinkled to that degree that it appeared to have been quilted at some time or other. In this gorgeous costume he attended the funeral. And when he returned, his own dog drove him away from the cabin, not recognizing him. This is true.

You would not like to live in a country where flour was $40 a barrel? Very well; then, I suppose you would not like to live here, where flour was $100 a barrel when I first came here. And shortly afterwards, it couldn’t be had at any price – and for one month the people lived on barley, beans and beef – and nothing beside. Oh, no – we didn’t luxuriate then! Perhaps not. But we said wise and severe things about the vanity and wickedness of high living. We preached our doctrine and practised it. Which course I respectfully recommend to the clergymen of St. Louis.

Where is Beack Jolly? (a pilot) and Bixby?

Your Brother,

Sam.

IV. Letters 1863-64. “Mark Twain.” Comstock Journalism. Artemus Ward

There is a long hiatus in the correspondence here. For a space of many months there is but one letter to continue the story. Others were written, of course, but for some reason they have not survived. It was about the end of August (1862) when the miner finally abandoned the struggle, and with his pack on his shoulders walked the one and thirty miles over the mountains to Virginia City, arriving dusty, lame, and travel-stained to claim at last his rightful inheritance. At the Enterprise office he was welcomed, and in a brief time entered into his own. Goodman, the proprietor, himself a man of great ability, had surrounded himself with a group of gay-hearted fellows, whose fresh, wild way of writing delighted the Comstock pioneers far more than any sober presentation of mere news. Samuel Clemens fitted exactly into this group. By the end of the year he had become a leader of it. When he asked to be allowed to report the coming Carson legislature, Goodman consented, realizing that while Clemens knew nothing of parliamentary procedure, he would at least make the letters picturesque.

It was in the midst of this work that he adopted the name which he was to make famous throughout the world. The story of its adoption has been fully told elsewhere and need not be repeated here[8]. —

“Mark Twain” was first signed to a Carson letter, February 2, 1863, and from that time was attached to all of Samuel Clemens’s work. The letters had already been widely copied, and the name now which gave them personality quickly obtained vogue. It was attached to himself as well as to the letters; heretofore he had been called Sam or Clemens, now he became almost universally Mark Twain and Mark.

This early period of Mark Twain’s journalism is full of delicious history, but we are permitted here to retell only such of it as will supply connection to the infrequent letters. He wrote home briefly in February, but the letter contained nothing worth preserving. Then two months later he gives us at least a hint of his employment.

To Mrs. Jane Clemens and Mrs. Moffett, in St. Louis:

Virginia, April 11, 1863.

My dear mother and sister, – It is very late at night, and I am writing in my room, which is not quite as large or as nice as the one I had at home. My board, washing and lodging cost me seventy-five dollars a month.

I have just received your letter, Ma, from Carson – the one in which you doubt my veracity about the statements I made in a letter to you. That’s right. I don’t recollect what the statements were, but I suppose they were mining statistics. I have just finished writing up my report for the morning paper, and giving the Unreliable a column of advice about how to conduct himself in church, and now I will tell you a few more lies, while my hand is in. For instance, some of the boys made me a present of fifty feet in the East India G. and S. M. Company ten days ago. I was offered ninety-five dollars a foot for it, yesterday, in gold. I refused it – not because I think the claim is worth a cent for I don’t but because I had a curiosity to see how high it would go, before people find out how worthless it is. Besides, what if one mining claim does fool me? I have got plenty more. I am not in a particular hurry to get rich. I suppose I couldn’t well help getting rich here some time or other, whether I wanted to or not. You folks do not believe in Nevada, and I am glad you don’t. Just keep on thinking so.

I was at the Gould and Curry mine, the other day, and they had two or three tons of choice rock piled up, which was valued at $20,000 a ton. I gathered up a hat-full of chunks, on account of their beauty as specimens – they don’t let everybody supply themselves so liberally. I send Mr. Moffett a little specimen of it for his cabinet. If you don’t know what the white stuff on it is, I must inform you that it is purer silver than the minted coin. There is about as much gold in it as there is silver, but it is not visible. I will explain to you some day how to detect it.

Pamela, you wouldn’t do for a local reporter – because you don’t appreciate the interest that attaches to names. An item is of no use unless it speaks of some person, and not then, unless that person’s name is distinctly mentioned. The most interesting letter one can write, to an absent friend, is one that treats of persons he has been acquainted with rather than the public events of the day. Now you speak of a young lady who wrote to Hollie Benson that she had seen me; and you didn’t mention her name. It was just a mere chance that I ever guessed who she was – but I did, finally, though I don’t remember her name, now. I was introduced to her in San Francisco by Hon. A. B. Paul, and saw her afterwards in Gold Hill. They were a very pleasant lot of girls – she and her sisters.

P. S. I have just heard five pistol shots down street – as such things are in my line, I will go and see about it.

P. S. № 2–5 A.M. – The pistol did its work well – one man – a Jackson County Missourian, shot two of my friends, (police officers,) through the heart – both died within three minutes. Murderer’s name is John Campbell.

The “Unreliable” of this letter was a rival reporter on whom Mark Twain had conferred this name during the legislative session. His real name was Rice, and he had undertaken to criticize Clemens’s reports. The brisk reply that Rice’s letters concealed with a show of parliamentary knowledge a “festering mass of misstatements the author of whom should be properly termed the ’Unreliable,” fixed that name upon him for life. This burlesque warfare delighted the frontier and it did not interfere with friendship. Clemens and Rice were constant associates, though continually firing squibs at each other in their respective papers – a form of personal journalism much in vogue on the Comstock.

In the next letter we find these two journalistic “blades” enjoying themselves together in the coast metropolis. This letter is labeled “No. 2,” meaning, probably, the second from San Francisco, but No. 1 has disappeared, and even No, 2 is incomplete.

To Mrs. Jane Clemens and Mrs. Moffett, in St. Louis:

No. 2—($20.00 Enclosed)

Lick house, S. F., June 1, ’63.

My dear mother and sister, – The Unreliable and myself are still here, and still enjoying ourselves. I suppose I know at least a thousand people here – a great many of them citizens of San Francisco, but the majority belonging in Washoe – and when I go down Montgomery street, shaking hands with Tom, Dick and Harry, it is just like being in Main street in Hannibal and meeting the old familiar faces. I do hate to go back to Washoe. We fag ourselves completely out every day, and go to sleep without rocking, every night. We dine out and we lunch out, and we eat, drink and are happy – as it were. After breakfast, I don’t often see the hotel again until midnight – or after. I am going to the Dickens mighty fast. I know a regular village of families here in the house, but I never have time to call on them. Thunder! we’ll know a little more about this town, before we leave, than some of the people who live in it. We take trips across the Bay to Oakland, and down to San Leandro, and Alameda, and those places; and we go out to the Willows, and Hayes Park, and Fort Point, and up to Benicia; and yesterday we were invited out on a yachting excursion, and had a sail in the fastest yacht on the Pacific Coast. Rice says: “Oh, no – we are not having any fun, Mark – Oh, no, I reckon not – it’s somebody else – it’s probably the ’gentleman in the wagon’!” (popular slang phrase.) When I invite Rice to the Lick House to dinner, the proprietors send us champagne and claret, and then we do put on the most disgusting airs. Rice says our calibre is too light – we can’t stand it to be noticed!