nd had
called to express his thanks for it. He sat talking to Fields, when
Howells entered the editorial rooms, and on being presented to the
author of the review, delivered his appreciation in the form of a story,
sufficiently appropriate, but not qualified for the larger types.--[He
said: "When I read that review of yours, I felt like the woman who was
so glad her baby had come white."]

His manner, his humor, his quaint colloquial forms all delighted
Howells--more, in fact, than the opulent sealskin overcoat which he
affected at this period--a garment astonishing rather than esthetic, as
Mark Twain's clothes in those days of his first regeneration were likely
to be startling enough, we may believe; in the conservative atmosphere
of the Atlantic rooms. And Howells--gentle, genial, sincere--filled
with the early happiness of his calling, won the heart of Mark Twain
and never lost it, and, what is still more notable, won his absolute and
unvarying confidence in all literary affairs. It was always Mark Twain's
habit to rely on somebody, and in matters pertaining to literature and
to literary people in general he laid his burden on William Dean Howells
from that day. Only a few weeks after that first visit we find him
telegraphing to Howells, asking him to look after a Californian poet,
then ill and friendless in Brooklyn. Clemens states that he does
not know the poet, but will contribute fifty dollars if Howells
will petition the steamboat company for a pass; and no doubt Howells
complied, and spent a good deal more than fifty dollars' worth of time
to get the poet relieved and started; it would be like him.

LXXIV. THE WEDDING-DAY

The wedding was planned, at first, either for Christmas or New-Year's
Day; but as the lecture engagements continued into January it was
decided to wait until these were filled. February 2d, a date near the
anniversary of the engagement, was agreed upon, also a quiet wedding
with no "tour." The young people would go immediately to Buffalo, and
take up a modest residence, in a boardinghouse as comfortable, even as
luxurious, as the husband's financial situation justified. At least that
was Samuel Clemens's understanding of the matter. He felt that he was
heavily in debt--that his first duty was to relieve himself of that
obligation.

There were other plans in Elmira, but in the daily and happy letters he
received there was no inkling of any new purpose.

He wrote to J. D. F. Slee, o