me out and attend
to it. He must get rid of that propensity for tumbling down, though,
for when we get fairly started here, I don't think we shall have time to
pick up those who fall.....

That is Stoughter's house, I expect, that Cousin Jim has moved into.
This is just the country for Cousin Jim to live in. I don't believe it
would take him six months to make $100,000 here, if he had 3,000 dollars
to commence with. I suppose he can't leave his family though.

Tell Mrs. Benson I never intend to be a lawyer. I have been a slave
several times in my life, but I'll never be one again. I always intend
to be so situated (unless I marry,) that I can "pull up stakes" and
clear out whenever I feel like it.

We are very thankful to you, Pamela, for the papers you send. We have
received half a dozen or more, and, next to letters, they are the most
welcome visitors we have.

Write oftener, Pamela.
Yr. Brother
SAM.

The "Cousin Jim" mentioned in this letter is the original of the
character of Colonel Sellers. Whatever Mark Twain's later opinion of
Cousin Jim Lampton's financial genius may have been, he seems to have
respected it at this time.

More than three months pass until we have another letter, and in that
time the mining fever had become well seated. Mark Twain himself was
full of the Sellers optimism, and it was bound to overflow, fortify as
he would against it.

He met with little enough encouragement. With three companions, in
midwinter, he made a mining excursion to the much exploited Humboldt
region, returning empty-handed after a month or two of hard experience.
This is the trip picturesquely described in Chapters XXVII to XXXIII of
Roughing It.--[It is set down historically in Mark Twain 'A Biography.'
Harper & brothers.]--He, mentions the Humboldt in his next letter, but
does not confess his failure.

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

CARSON CITY, Feb. 8, 1862.

MY DEAR MOTHER AND SISTER,--By George Pamela, I begin to fear that
I have invoked a Spirit of some kind or other which I will find
some difficulty in laying. I wasn't much terrified by your growing
inclinations, but when you begin to call presentiments to your aid, I
confess that I "weaken." Mr. Moffett is right, as I said before--and I
am not