political record that you are
moved to tears; there's a lump in your throat and you are thankful
that you have lived for this happiness. Then the stranger discloses
his ax, and you are ashamed of yourself and your race. Six
repetitions will cure you. After that you interrupt the compliments
and say, "Yes, yes, that's all right; never mind about that. What
is it you want?"

But you and I are in the business ourselves. Every now and then we
carry our ax to somebody and ask a whet. I don't carry mine to
strangers--I draw the line there; perhaps that is your way. This is
bound to set us up on a high and holy pinnacle and make us look down
in cold rebuke on persons who carry their axes to strangers.

I do not know how to answer that stranger's letter. I wish he had
spared me. Never mind about him--I am thinking about myself. I
wish he had spared me. The book has not arrived yet; but no matter,
I am prejudiced against it.

It was a few days later that he added:

I wrote to that man. I fell back upon the old Overworked, polite
lie, and thanked him for his book and said I was promising myself
the pleasure of reading it. Of course that set me free; I was not
obliged to read it now at all, and, being free, my prejudice was
gone, and as soon as the book came I opened it to see what it was
like. I was not able to put it down until I had finished. It was
an embarrassing thing to have to write to that man and confess that
fact, but I had to do it. That first letter was merely a lie. Do
you think I wrote the second one to give that man pleasure? Well, I
did, but it was second-hand pleasure. I wrote it first to give
myself comfort, to make myself forget the original lie.

Mark Twain's interest was once aroused by the following:

DEAR SIR,--I have had more or less of your works on my shelves for
years, and believe I have practically a complete set now. This is
nothing unusual, of course, but I presume it will seem to you
unusual for any one to keep books constantly in sight which the
owner regrets ever having read.

Every time my glance rests on the books I do regret having read
them, and do not hesitate to tell you so to your face, and care not
who may know my feelings. You, who must be kept busy attending to
your correspondence, will probably pay little or no attention to
this small f