d honorably
intended, can wreck our repute and extinguish our friendships.

I hope that no society will be named for me while I am still alive, for
I might at some time or other do something which would cause its members
to regret having done me that honor. After I shall have joined the dead
I shall follow the customs of those people and be guilty of no conduct
that can wound any friend; but until that time shall come I shall be a
doubtful quantity like the rest of our race.

Very truly yours,
S. L. CLEMENS.

The National Mark Twain Association did not surrender easily. Mr.
Gatts wrote a second letter full of urgent appeal. If Mark Twain
was tempted, we get no hint of it in his answer.

*****

To T. F. Gatts, of Missouri:

NEW YORK, June 8, 1903.

DEAR MR. GATTS,--While I am deeply touched by the desire of my friends
of Hannibal to confer these great honors upon me, I must still forbear
to accept them. Spontaneous and unpremeditated honors, like those which
came to me at Hannibal, Columbia, St. Louis and at the village stations
all down the line, are beyond all price and are a treasure for life
in the memory, for they are a free gift out of the heart and they
come without solicitations; but I am a Missourian and so I shrink from
distinctions which have to be arranged beforehand and with my privity,
for I then became a party to my own exalting. I am humanly fond
of honors that happen but chary of those that come by canvass and
intention. With sincere thanks to you and your associates for this high
compliment which you have been minded to offer me, I am,

Very truly yours,
S. L. CLEMENS.

We have seen in the letter to MacAlister that Mark Twain's wife had
been ordered to Italy and plans were in progress for an
establishment there. By the end of June Mrs. Clemens was able to
leave Riverdale, and she made the journey to Quarry Farm, Elmira,
where they would remain until October, the month planned for their
sailing. The house in Hartford had been sold; and a house which,
prior to Mrs. Clemens's breakdown they had bought near Tarrytown
(expecting to settle permanently on the Hudson) had been let. They
were going to Europe for another indefinite period.