t. It would take too long. Let
us send the Gerhardts to Paris ourselves, and say nothing about it to any
one else."

So the Gerhardts, provided with funds and an arrangement that would
enable them to live for five years in Paris if necessary, were started
across the sea without further delay.

Clemens and his wife were often doing something of this sort. There was
seldom a time that they were not paying the way of some young man or
woman through college, or providing means and opportunity for development
in some special field of industry.

CXXXIV

LITERARY PROJECTS AND A MONUMENT TO ADAM

Mark Twain's literary work languished during this period. He had a world
of plans, as usual, and wrote plentifully, but without direction or
conclusion. "A Curious Experience," which relates a circumstance told to
him by an army officer, is about the most notable of the few completed
manuscripts of this period.

Of the books projected (there were several), a burlesque manual of
etiquette would seem to have been the most promising. Howells had faith
in it, and of the still remaining fragments a few seem worth quoting:

AT BILLIARDS

If your ball glides along in the intense and immediate vicinity of
the object-ball, and a count seems exquisitely imminent, lift one
leg; then one shoulder; then squirm your body around in sympathy
with the direction of the moving ball; and at the instant when the
ball seems on the point of colliding throw up both of your arms
violently. Your cue will probably break a chandelier, but no
matter; you have done what you could to help the count.

AT THE DOG-FIGHT

If it occur in your block, courteously give way to strangers
desiring a view, particularly ladies.

Avoid showing partiality toward the one dog, lest you hurt the
feelings of the other one.

Let your secret sympathies and your compassion be always with the
under dog in the fight--this is magnanimity; but bet on the other
one--this is business.

AT POKER

If you draw to a flush and fail to fill, do not continue the
conflict.

If you hold a pair of trays, and your opponent is blind, and it
costs you fifty to see him, let him remain unperceived.

If you hold nothing but ace high, and by some means you know that
the other man holds the rest of the aces, and he calls, excuse
yourself;