had a
profitable play, and was in no hurry for the recrudescence of Sellers.
Howells tells how he eventually took the manuscript to Raymond, whom he
found "in a mood of sweet reasonableness" at one of Osgood's luncheons.
Raymond said he could not do the play then, but was sure he would like
it for the coming season, and in any case would be glad to read it.

In due time Raymond reported favorably on the play, at least so far
as the first act was concerned, but he objected to the materialization
feature and to Sellers as claimant for the English earldom. He asked
that these features be eliminated, or at least much ameliorated; but as
these constituted the backbone and purpose of the whole play, Clemens
and Howells decided that what was left would be hardly worth while.
Raymond finally agreed to try the play as it was in one of the larger
towns--Howells thinks in Buffalo. A week later the manuscript came back
to Webster, who had general charge of the business negotiations, as
indeed he had of all Mark Twain's affairs at this time, and with it a
brief line:

DEAR SIR,--I have just finished rereading the play, and am convinced
that in its present form it would not prove successful. I return
the manuscript by express to your address.

Thanking you for your courtesy, I am,

Yours truly, JOHN T. RAYMOND.

P.S.--If the play is altered and made longer I will be pleased to
read it again.

In his former letter Raymond had declared that "Sellers, while a very
sanguine man, was not a lunatic, and no one but a lunatic could for
a moment imagine that he had done such a work" (meaning the
materialization). Clearly Raymond wanted a more serious presentation,
something akin to his earlier success, and on the whole we can hardly
blame him. But the authors had faith in their performance as it stood,
and agreed they would make no change.

Finally a well-known elocutionist, named Burbank, conceived the notion
of impersonating Raymond as well as Sellers, making of it a sort of
double burlesque, and agreed to take the play on those terms. Burbank
came to Hartford and showed what he could do. Howells and Clemens agreed
to give him the play, and they hired the old Lyceum Theater for a week,
at seven hundred dollars, for its trial presentation. Daniel Frohman
promoted it. Clemens and Howells went over the play and made some
changes, but they were not as hilarious over it or as full of
enthusiasm as they had b