bountiful life, and sappy cynicisms
about girls, has since climbed the Alps of fame and stood against the
sun one brief tremendous moment with the world's eyes upon him, and
then--f-z-t-! where is he? Why the only long thing, the only real thing
about the whole shadowy business is the sense of the lagging dull and
hoary lapse of time that has drifted by since then; a vast empty level,
it seems, with a formless spectre glimpsed fitfully through the smoke
and mist that lie along its remote verge.

Well, we are all getting along here first-rate; Livy gains strength
daily, and sits up a deal; the baby is five weeks old and--but no more
of this; somebody may be reading this letter 80 years hence. And so, my
friend (you pitying snob, I mean, who are holding this yellow paper in
your hand in 1960,) save yourself the trouble of looking further; I know
how pathetically trivial our small concerns will seem to you, and I
will not let your eye profane them. No, I keep my news; you keep your
compassion. Suffice it you to know, scoffer and ribald, that the little
child is old and blind, now, and once more toothless; and the rest of us
are shadows, these many, many years. Yes, and your time cometh!

MARK.

At the Farm that year Mark Twain was working on The Prince and the
Pauper, and, according to a letter to Aldrich, brought it to an end
September 19th. It is a pleasant letter, worth preserving. The
book by Aldrich here mentioned was 'The Stillwater Tragedy.'

*****

To T. B. Aldrich, in Ponkapog, Mass.:

ELMIRA, Sept. 15, '80.

MY DEAR ALDRICH,--Thank you ever so much for the book--I had already
finished it, and prodigiously enjoyed it, in the periodical of the
notorious Howells, but it hits Mrs. Clemens just right, for she is
having a reading holiday, now, for the first time in same months; so
between-times, when the new baby is asleep and strengthening up for
another attempt to take possession of this place, she is going to read
it. Her strong friendship for you makes her think she is going to like
it.

I finished a story yesterday, myself. I counted up and found it between
sixty and eighty thousand words--about the size of your book. It is for
boys and girls--been at work at it several years, off and on.

I hope Howells is enjoying his journey to the Pacific. He wrote me that
you and Osgood were