tired of it before it reached completion, though not before it had
attained the proportions of a book of size. As a whole it would hardly
have added to his reputation, though it is not without fine and humorous
passages, and certainly not without interest. Its chief mission was to
divert him mentally that summer during, those days and nights when he
would otherwise have been alone and brooding upon his loneliness.--[For
extracts from "3,000 Years among the Microbes" see Appendix V, at the end
of this work.]
MARK TWAIN'S SUGGESTED TITLE-PAGE FOR HIS MICROBE BOOK:

3000 YEARS
AMONG THE MICROBES

By a Microbe

WITH NOTES
added by the same Hand
7000 years later

Translated from the Original
Microbic
by

Mark Twain

His inability to reproduce faces in his mind's eye he mourned as an
increasing calamity. Photographs were lifeless things, and when he tried
to conjure up the faces of his dead they seemed to drift farther out of
reach; but now and then kindly sleep brought to him something out of that
treasure-house where all our realities are kept for us fresh and fair,
perhaps for a day when we may claim them again. Once he wrote to Mrs.
Crane:

SUSY DEAR,--I have had a lovely dream. Livy, dressed in black, was
sitting up in my bed (here) at my right & looking as young & sweet
as she used to when she was in health. She said, "What is the name
of your sweet sister?" I said, "Pamela." "Oh yes, that is it, I
thought it was--(naming a name which has escaped me) won't you write
it down for me?" I reached eagerly for a pen & pad, laid my hands
upon both, then said to myself, "It is only a dream," and turned
back sorrowfully & there she was still. The conviction flamed
through me that our lamented disaster was a dream, & this a reality.
I said, "How blessed it is, how blessed it is, it was all a dream,
only a dream!" She only smiled and did not ask what dream I meant,
which surprised me. She leaned her head against mine & kept saying,
"I was perfectly sure it was a dream; I never would have believed it
wasn't." I think she said several things, but if so they are gone
from my memory. I woke & did not know I had been dreaming. She was
gone. I wondered how she