From that time forward Orion Clemens was worth substantially twenty
thousand dollars--till the day of his death, and, after him, his widow.
Far better was it for him that the endowment be conferred in the form of
an income, than had the capital amount been placed in his hands.

CXXVIII. MARK TWAIN's ABSENT-MINDEDNESS.

A number of amusing incidents have been more or less accurately reported
concerning Mark Twain's dim perception of certain physical surroundings,
and his vague resulting memories--his absent-mindedness, as we say.

It was not that he was inattentive--no man was ever less so if the
subject interested him--but only that the casual, incidental thing
seemed not to find a fixed place in his deeper consciousness.

By no means was Mark Twain's absent-mindedness a development of old age.
On the two occasions following he was in the very heyday of his mental
strength. Especially was it, when he was engaged upon some absorbing or
difficult piece of literature, that his mind seemed to fold up and shut
most of the world away. Soon after his return from Europe, when he was
still struggling with 'A Tramp Abroad', he wearily put the manuscript
aside, one day, and set out to invite F. G. Whitmore over for a game of
billiards. Whitmore lived only a little way down the street, and Clemens
had been there time and again. It was such a brief distance that he
started out in his slippers and with no hat. But when he reached the
corner where the house, a stone's-throw away, was in plain view he
stopped. He did not recognize it. It was unchanged, but its outlines
had left no impress upon his mind. He stood there uncertainly a little
while, then returned and got the coachman, Patrick McAleer, to show him
the way.

The second, and still more picturesque instance, belongs also to this
period. One day, when he was playing billiards with Whitmore, George,
the butler, came up with a card.

"Who is he, George?" Clemens asked, without looking at the card.

"I don't know, suh, but he's a gentleman, Mr. Clemens."

"Now, George, how many times have I told you I don't want to see
strangers when I'm playing billiards! This is just some book agent, or
insurance man, or somebody with something to sell. I don't want to see
him, and I'm not going to."

"Oh, but this is a gentleman, I'm sure, Mr. Clemens. Just look at his
card, suh."

"Yes, of course, I see--nice engraved card--but I don't know him, and if
it was St. Peter himsel