n Christendom. It would be translated into every
language which was anywhere written or printed; it would be circulated
literally in every country of the globe, and Clemens's book agents would
carry the prospectuses and then the bound copies of the work to the ends
of the whole earth. Not only would every Catholic buy it, but every
Catholic must, as he was a good Catholic, as he hoped to be saved. It
was a magnificent scheme, and it captivated me, as it had captivated
Clemens; it dazzled us both, and neither of us saw the fatal defect in
it. We did not consider how often Catholics could not read, how often
when they could, they might not wish to read. The event proved that
whether they could read or not the immeasurable majority did not wish to
read the life of the Pope, though it was written by a dignitary of the
Church and issued to the world with every sanction from the Vatican. The
failure was incredible to Clemens; his sanguine soul was utterly
confounded, and soon a silence fell upon it where it had been so
exuberantly jubilant.

XIX.

The occasions which brought us to New York together were not nearly so
frequent as those which united us in Boston, but there was a dinner given
him by a friend which remains memorable from the fatuity of two men
present, so different in everything but their fatuity. One was the sweet
old comedian Billy Florence, who was urging the unsuccessful dramatist
across the table to write him a play about Oliver Cromwell, and giving
the reasons why he thought himself peculiarly fitted to portray the
character of Cromwell. The other was a modestly millioned rich man who
was then only beginning to amass the moneys afterward heaped so high, and
was still in the condition to be flattered by the condescension of a yet
greater millionaire. His contribution to our gaiety was the verbatim
report of a call he had made upon William H. Vanderbilt, whom he had
found just about starting out of town, with his trunks actually in the
front hall, but who had stayed to receive the narrator. He had, in fact,
sat down on one of the trunks, and talked with the easiest friendliness,
and quite, we were given to infer, like an ordinary human being. Clemens
often kept on with some thread of the talk when we came away from a
dinner, but now he was silent, as if "high sorrowful and cloyed"; and it
was not till well afterward that I found he had noted the facts from the
bitterness with which he mocked the rich m