Then years afterwards I was talking with Dr. Holmes about
it. He was not an ignorant ass--no, not he: he was not a collection of
decayed human turnips, like your "Plagiarism Court;" and so when I said,
"I know now where I stole it, but whom did you steal it from," he said,
"I don't remember; I only know I stole it from somebody, because I have
never originated anything altogether myself, nor met anybody who had."

To think of those solemn donkeys breaking a little child's heart
with their ignorant rubbish about plagiarism! I couldn't sleep for
blaspheming about it last night. Why, their whole lives, their whole
histories, all their learning, all their thoughts, all their opinions
were one solid ruck of plagiarism, and they didn't know it and
never suspected it. A gang of dull and hoary pirates piously setting
themselves the task of disciplining and purifying a kitten that they
think they've caught filching a chop! Oh, dam--

But you finish it, dear, I am running short of vocabulary today. Ever
lovingly your friend,

MARK.

(Edited and modified by Clara Clemens, deputy to her mother, who for
more than 7 months has been ill in bed and unable to exercise her
official function.)

The burden of the Clemens household had fallen almost entirely upon
Clara Clemens. In addition to supervising its customary affairs,
she also shouldered the responsibility of an unusual combination of
misfortunes, for besides the critical condition of her mother, her
sister, Jean Clemens, was down with pneumonia, no word of which must
come to Mrs. Clemens. Certainly it was a difficult position. In
some account of it, which he set down later, Clemens wrote: "It was
fortunate for us all that Clara's reputation for truthfulness was so
well established in her mother's mind. It was our daily protection
from disaster. The mother never doubted Clara's word. Clara could
tell her large improbabilities without exciting any suspicion,
whereas if I tried to market even a small and simple one the case
would have been different. I was never able to get a reputation
like Clara's."

The accumulation of physical ailments in the Clemens home had
somewhat modified Mark Twain's notion of medical practice. He was
no longer radical; he had become eclectic. It is a good deal of a
concession that he makes to Twichell, after th