kind and knew that the highest and first ladies and gentlemen in England
had remained little or no cleaner in their talk, and in the morals and
conduct which such talk implies, clear up to one hundred years ago; in
fact clear into our own nineteenth century–in which century, broadly
speaking, the earliest samples of the real lady and the real gentleman
discoverable in English history,–or in European history, for that
matter–may be said to have made their appearance. Suppose Sir Walter
[Scott] instead of putting the conversation into the mouths of his
characters, had allowed the characters to speak for themselves? We
should have had talk from Rebecca and Ivanhoe and the soft lady Rowena
which would embarrass a tramp in our day. However, to the unconsciously
indelicate all things are delicate.”
Mark Twain’s interest in history and in the depiction of historical
periods and characters is revealed through his fondness for historical
reading in preference to fiction, and through his other historical
writings. Even in the hilarious, youthful days in San Francisco, Paine
reports that “Clemens, however, was never quite ready for sleep. Then,
as ever, he would prop himself up in bed, light his pipe, and lose
himself in English or French history until his sleep conquered.” Paine
tells us, too, that Lecky’s ‘European Morals’ was an old favorite.
The notes to ‘The Prince and the Pauper’ show again how carefully Clemens
examined his historical background, and his interest in these materials.
Some of the more important sources are noted: Hume’s ‘History of
England’, Timbs’ ‘Curiosities of London’, J. Hammond Trumbull’s ‘Blue
Laws, True and False’. Apparently Mark Twain relished it, for as Bernard
DeVoto points out, “The book is always Mark Twain. Its parodies of Tudor
speech lapse sometimes into a callow satisfaction in that idiom–Mark
hugely enjoys his nathlesses and beshrews and marrys.” The writing of
1601 foreshadows his fondness for this treatment.
“Do you suppose the liberties and the Brawn of These States have to
do only with delicate lady-words? with gloved gentleman words”
Walt Whitman, ‘An American Primer’.
Although 1601 was not matched by any similar sketch in his published
works, it was representative of Mark Twain the man. He was no emaciated
literary tea-tosser. Bronzed and weatherbeaten son of the West, Mark was
a man’s man, and that significant fact is emphasized by the several
phases of Mark’s rich life as steamboat pilot, printer, miner, and
frontier journalist.
On the Virginia City Enterprise Mark learned from editor R. M. Daggett
that “when it was necessary to call a man names, there were no expletives
too long or too expressive to be hurled in rapid succession to emphasize
the utter want of character of the man assailed…. There were
typesetters there who could hurl anathemas at bad copy which would have
frightened a Bengal tiger. The news editor could damn a mutilated
dispatch in twenty-four languages.”
In San Francisco in the sizzling sixties we catch a glimpse of Mark Twain
and his buddy, Steve Gillis, pausing in doorways to sing “The Doleful
Ballad of the Neglected Lover,” an old piece of uncollected erotica.
One morning, when a dog began to howl, Steve awoke “to find his room-mate
standing in the door that opened out into a back garden, holding a big
revolver, his hand shaking with cold and excitement,” relates Paine in
his Biography.
“‘Come here, Steve,’ he said. ‘I’m so chilled through I can’t get a bead
on him.’
“‘Sam,’ said Steve, ‘don’t shoot him. Just swear at him. You can easily
kill him at any range with your profanity.’
“Steve Gillis declares that Mark Twain let go such a scorching, singeing
blast that the brute’s owner sold him the next day for a Mexican hairless
dog.”
Nor did Mark’s “geysers of profanity” cease spouting after these gay and
youthful days in San Francisco. With Clemens it may truly be said that
profanity was an art–a pyrotechnic art that entertained nations.
“It was my duty to keep buttons on his shirts,” recalled Katy Leary,
life-long housekeeper and friend in the Clemens menage, “and he’d swear
something terrible if I didn’t. If he found a shirt in his drawer
without a button on, he’d take every single shirt out of that drawer and