Who tried to hustle the East."

"I could stand any amount of that," he said, and presently: "Life is too
long and too short. Too long for the weariness of it; too short for the
work to be done. At the very most, the average mind can only master a
few languages and a little history."

I said: "Still, we need not worry. If death ends all it does not matter;
and if life is eternal there will be time enough."

"Yes," he assented, rather grimly, "that optimism of yours is always
ready to turn hell's back yard into a playground."

I said that, old as I was, I had taken up the study of French, and
mentioned Bayard Taylor's having begun Greek at fifty, expecting to need
it in heaven.

Clemens said, reflectively: "Yes--but you see that was Greek."

CCLXXXI. THE LAST SUMMER AT STORMFIELD

I was at Stormfield pretty constantly during the rest of that year. At
first I went up only for the day; but later, when his health did not
improve, and when he expressed a wish for companionship evenings, I
remained most of the nights as well. Our rooms were separated only by
a bath-room; and as neither of us was much given to sleep, there was
likely to be talk or reading aloud at almost any hour when both were
awake. In the very early morning I would usually slip in, softly,
sometimes to find him propped up against his pillows sound asleep, his
glasses on, the reading-lamp blazing away as it usually did, day or
night; but as often as not he was awake, and would have some new plan
or idea of which he was eager to be delivered, and there was always
interest, and nearly always amusement in it, even if it happened to be
three in the morning or earlier.

Sometimes, when he thought it time for me to be stirring, he would call
softly, but loudly enough for me to hear if awake; and I would go in,
and we would settle again problems of life and death and science, or,
rather, he would settle them while I dropped in a remark here and there,
merely to hold the matter a little longer in solution.

The pains in his breast came back, and with a good deal of frequency as
the summer advanced; also, they became more severe. Dr. Edward Quintard
came up from New York, and did not hesitate to say that the trouble
proceeded chiefly from the heart, and counseled diminished smoking, with
less active exercise, advising particularly against Clemens's lifetime
habit of lightly skipping up and down stairs.

There was no prohibition as to billiards