of four hundred and fifty dollars a
week and expenses, and he paid Pond a commission. Perhaps, without going
any further, we may say that the tour was a financial success, and
yielded a large return of the needed funds.

Clemens and Cable had a pleasant enough time, and had it not been for the
absence from home and the disagreeableness of railway travel, there would
have been little to regret. They were a curiously associated pair. Cable
was orthodox in his religion, devoted to Sunday-school, Bible reading,
and church affairs in general. Clemens--well, Clemens was different. On
the first evening of their tour, when the latter was comfortably settled
in bed with an entertaining book, Cable appeared with his Bible, and
proceeded to read a chapter aloud. Clemens made no comment, and this
went on for an evening or two more. Then he said:

"See here, Cable, we'll have to cut this part of the program out. You
can read the Bible as much as you please so long as you don't read it to
me."

Cable retired courteously. He had a keen sense of humor, and most things
that Mark Twain did, whether he approved or not, amused him. Cable did
not smoke, but he seemed always to prefer the smoking compartment when
they traveled, to the more respectable portions of the car. One day
Clemens sand to him:

"Cable, why do you sit in here? You don't smoke, and you know I always
smoke, and sometimes swear."

Cable said, "I know, Mark, I don't do these things, but I can't help
admiring the way you do them."

When Sunday came it was Mark Twain's great happiness to stay in bed all
day, resting after his week of labor; but Cable would rise, bright and
chipper, dress himself in neat and suitable attire, and visit the various
churches and Sunday-schools in town, usually making a brief address at
each, being always invited to do so.

It seems worth while to include one of the Clemens-Cable programs here
--a most satisfactory one. They varied it on occasion, and when they
were two nights in a place changed it completely, but the program here
given was the one they were likely to use after they had proved its
worth:

PROGRAM

Richling's visit to Kate Riley
GEO. W. CABLE

King Sollermun
MARK TWAIN

(a) Kate Riley and Ristofolo
(b) Narcisse in mourning for "Lady Byron"
(c) Mary's Night Rid