indeed always had a friendly feeling toward Satan (at least, as
he conceived him), and just at this time addressed a number of letters
to him concerning affairs in general--cordial, sympathetic, informing
letters enough, though apparently not suited for publication. A good
deal of the work done at this period did not find its way into print.
An interview with Satan; a dream-story concerning a platonic sweetheart,
and some further comment on Austrian politics, are among the condemned
manuscripts.

Mark Twain's interest in Satan would seem later to have extended to his
relatives, for there are at least three bulky manuscripts in which
he has attempted to set down some episodes in the life of one "Young
Satan," a nephew, who appears to have visited among the planets and
promoted some astonishing adventures in Austria several centuries ago.
The idea of a mysterious, young, and beautiful stranger who would visit
the earth and perform mighty wonders, was always one which Mark Twain
loved to play with, and a nephew of Satan's seemed to him properly
qualified to carry out his intention. His idea was that this celestial
visitant was not wicked, but only indifferent to good and evil and
suffering, having no personal knowledge of any of these things. Clemens
tried the experiment in various ways, and portions of the manuscript
are absorbingly interesting, lofty in conception, and rarely worked
out--other portions being merely grotesque, in which the illusion of
reality vanishes.

Among the published work of the Vienna period is an article about a
morality play, the "Master of Palmyra,"--[About play-acting, Forum,
October, 1898.]--by Adolf Wilbrandt, an impressive play presenting
Death, the all-powerful, as the principal part.

The Cosmopolitan Magazine for August published "At the Appetite-Cure,"
in which Mark Twain, in the guise of humor, set forth a very sound and
sensible idea concerning dietetics, and in October the same magazine
published his first article on "Christian Science and the Book of Mrs.
Eddy." As we have seen, Clemens had been always deeply interested
in mental healing, and in closing this humorous skit he made due
acknowledgments to the unseen forces which, properly employed, through
the imagination work physical benefits:

"Within the last quarter of a century," he says, "in America, several
sects of curers have appeared under various names and have done notable
things in the way of healing ailments without