bby;
this will never do--tell him I said so. He is a good lawyer--a, very
good lawyer--and a fine speaker--is very popular and much respected, and
makes many friends; but although he retains their friendship, he loses
their confidence by displaying his instability of character..... The
land he has now will be very valuable after a while--

S. L. C. Say a 50 years hence, or thereabouts. Madame--

MADAME. No--less time-but never mind the land, that is a secondary
consideration--let him drop that for the present, and devote himself to
his business and politics with all his might, for he must hold offices
under the Government.....

After a while you will possess a good deal of property--retire at the
end of ten years--after which your pursuits will be literary--try
the law--you will certainly succeed. I am done now. If you have any
questions to ask--ask them freely--and if it be in my power, I will
answer without reserve--without reserve.

I asked a few questions of minor importance--paid her $2--and left,
under the decided impression that going to the fortune teller's was
just as good as going to the opera, and the cost scarcely a trifle
more--ergo, I will disguise myself and go again, one of these days, when
other amusements fail. Now isn't she the devil? That is to say, isn't
she a right smart little woman?

When you want money, let Ma know, and she will send it. She and Pamela
are always fussing about change, so I sent them a hundred and twenty
quarters yesterday--fiddler's change enough to last till I get back, I
reckon.

SAM.

It is not so difficult to credit Madame Caprell with clairvoyant
powers when one has read the letters of Samuel Clemens up to this
point. If we may judge by those that have survived, her prophecy of
literary distinction for him was hardly warranted by anything she
could have known of his past performance. These letters of his
youth have a value to-day only because they were written by the man
who later was to become Mark Twain. The squibs and skits which he
sometimes contributed to the New Orleans papers were bright,
perhaps, and pleasing to his pilot associates, but they were without
literary value. He was twenty-five years old. More than one author
has achieved reputation at that age. Mark Twain was of slower
growth; at that age he had not even developed a definite literary