of the Clemens dwelling. He raised the one-story part of the building to
give them an added room up-stairs; and there for another two years, by
hard work and pinching economies, the dying paper managed to drag along.
It was the fire that furnished Sam Clemens with his Jim Wolfe sketch.
In it he stated that Jim in his excitement had carried the office broom
half a mile and had then come back after the wash-pan.

In the meantime Pamela Clemens married. Her husband was a well-to-do
merchant, William A. Moffett, formerly of Hannibal, but then of St.
Louis, where he had provided her with the comforts of a substantial
home.

Orion tried the experiment of a serial story. He wrote to a number of
well-known authors in the East, but was unable to find one who would
supply a serial for the price he was willing to pay. Finally he obtained
a translation of a French novel for the sum offered, which was five
dollars. It did not save the sinking ship, however. He made the
experiment of a tri-weekly, without success. He noticed that even his
mother no longer read his editorials, but turned to the general news.
This was a final blow.

"I sat down in the dark," he says, "the moon glinting in at the open
door. I sat with one leg over the chair and let my mind float."

He had received an offer of five hundred dollars for his office--the
amount of the mortgage--and in his moonlight reverie he decided to
dispose of it on those terms. This was in 1853.

His brother Samuel was no longer with him. Several months before,
in June, Sam decided he would go out into the world. He was in his
eighteenth year now, a good workman, faithful and industrious, but he
had grown restless in unrewarded service. Beyond his mastery of the
trade he had little to show for six years of hard labor. Once when
he had asked Orion for a few dollars to buy a second-hand gun, Orion,
exasperated by desperate circumstances, fell into a passion and rated
him for thinking of such extravagance. Soon afterward Sam confided to
his mother that he was going away; that he believed Orion hated him;
that there was no longer a place for him at home. He said he would go to
St. Louis, where Pamela was. There would be work for him in St. Louis,
and he could send money home. His intention was to go farther than St.
Louis, but he dared not tell her. His mother put together sadly enough
the few belongings of what she regarded as her one wayward boy; then she
held up a little Testament: