ls]

LXXIII

THE FIRST MEETING WITH HOWELLS

Clemens' first period of editorial work was a brief one, though he made
frequent contributions to the paper: sketches, squibs, travel-notes, and
experiences, usually humorous in character. His wedding-day had been set
for early in the year, and it was necessary to accumulate a bank account
for that occasion. Before October he was out on the lecture circuit,
billed now for the first time for New England, nervous and apprehensive
in consequence, though with good hope. To Pamela he wrote (November
9th):

To-morrow night I appear for the first time before a Boston audience
--4,000 critics--and on the success of this matter depends my future
success in New England. But I am not distressed. Nasby is in the same
boat. Tonight decides the fate of his brand-new lecture. He has just
left my room--been reading his lecture to me--was greatly depressed. I
have convinced him that he has little to fear.

Whatever alarm Mark Twain may have felt was not warranted. His success
with the New England public was immediate and complete. He made his
headquarters in Boston, at Redpath's office, where there was pretty sure
to be a congenial company, of which he was presently the center.

It was during one of these Boston sojourns that he first met William Dean
Howells, his future friend and literary counselor. Howells was assistant
editor of the Atlantic at this time; James T. Fields, its editor. Clemens
had been gratified by the Atlantic review, and had called to express his
thanks for it. He sat talking to Fields, when Howells entered the
editorial rooms, and on being presented to the author of the review,
delivered his appreciation in the form of a story, sufficiently
appropriate, but not qualified for the larger types.--[He said: "When I
read that review of yours, I felt like the woman who was so glad her baby
had come white."]

His manner, his humor, his quaint colloquial forms all delighted Howells
--more, in fact, than the opulent sealskin overcoat which he affected at
this period--a garment astonishing rather than esthetic, as Mark Twain's
clothes in those days of his first regeneration were likely to be
startling enough, we may believe; in the conservative atmosphere of the
Atlantic rooms. And Howells--gentle, genial, sincere--filled with the
early happiness of his calling, won the heart of Mark Twain and never
lost it, and, what is still more notable, won his absolute and unvar