were made before Christ was born; and in the
customs of their public dinners, and the ceremonies of every
official act, and the dresses of a thousand dignitaries, trace the
speech and manners of all the centuries that have dragged their
lagging decades over England since the Heptarchy fell asunder. I
would a good deal rather live here if I could get the rest of you
over.

He sailed November 12th, on the Batavia, loaded with Christmas presents
for everybody; jewelry, furs, laces; also a practical steam-engine for
his namesake, Sam Moffett. Half-way across the Atlantic the Batavia ran
into a hurricane and was badly damaged by heavy seas, and driven far out
of her course. It was a lucky event on the whole, for she fell in with a
water-logged lumber bark, a complete wreck, with nine surviving sailors
clinging to her rigging. In the midst of the wild gale a lifeboat was
launched and the perishing men were rescued. Clemens prepared a graphic
report of the matter for the Royal Humane Society, asking that medals
be conferred upon the brave rescuers, a document that was signed by his
fellow-passengers and obtained for the men complete recognition and wide
celebrity. Closing, the writer said:

As might have been anticipated, if I have been of any service toward
rescuing these nine shipwrecked human beings by standing around the
deck in a furious storm, without an umbrella, keeping an eye on
things and seeing that they were done right, and yelling whenever a
cheer seemed to be the important thing, I am glad and I am
satisfied. I ask no reward. I would do it again under the same
circumstances. But what I do plead for, earnestly and sincerely, is
that the Royal Humane Society will remember our captain and our
life-boat crew, and in so remembering them increase the high honor
and esteem in which the society is held all over the civilized
world.

The Batavia reached New York November 26, 1872. Mark Twain had been
absent three months, during which he had been brought to at least a
partial realization of what his work meant to him and to mankind.

An election had taken place during his absence--an election which
gratified him deeply, for it had resulted in the second presidency
of General Grant and in the defeat of Horace Greeley, whom he admired
perhaps, but not as presidential material. To Thomas Nast, who had aided
very effectually in Mr. Greeley's overwhelming d