S. L. CLEMENS.

CCLXXIII

STORMFIELD PHILOSOPHIES

Now came the tranquil days of the Connecticut autumn. The change of the
landscape colors was a constant delight to Mark Twain. There were
several large windows in his room, and he called them his
picture-gallery. The window-panes were small, and each formed a separate
picture of its own that was changing almost hourly. The red tones that
began to run through the foliage; the red berry bushes; the fading grass,
and the little touches of sparkling frost that came every now and then at
early morning; the background of distant blue hills and changing
skies-these things gave his gallery a multitude of variation that no
art-museums could furnish. He loved it all, and he loved to walk out in
it, pacing up and down the terrace, or the long path that led to the
pergola at the foot of a natural garden. If a friend came, he was
willing to walk much farther; and we often descended the hill in one
direction or another, though usually going toward the "gorge," a romantic
spot where a clear brook found its way through a deep and rather
dangerous-looking chasm. Once he was persuaded to descend into this
fairy-like place, for it was well worth exploring; but his footing was no
longer sure and he did not go far.

He liked better to sit on the grass-grown, rocky arch above and look down
into it, and let his talk follow his mood. He liked to contemplate the
geology of his surroundings, the record of the ageless periods of
construction required to build the world. The marvels of science always
appealed to him. He reveled in the thought of the almost limitless
stretches of time, the millions upon millions of years that had been
required for this stratum and that--he liked to amaze himself with the
sounding figures. I remember him expressing a wish to see the Grand
Canon of Arizona, where, on perpendicular walls six thousand feet high,
the long story of geological creation is written. I had stopped there
during my Western trip of the previous year, and I told him something of
its wonders. I urged him to see them for himself, offering to go with
him. He said:

"I should enjoy that; but the railroad journey is so far and I should
have no peace. The papers would get hold of it, and I would have to make
speeches and be interviewed, and I never want to do any of those things
again."

I suggested that the railroads would probably be glad to place a pri