Sketches New and Old by Mark Twain

Sketches New and Old by Mark Twain

Sketches New and Old by Mark Twain

SKETCHES NEW AND OLD

CONTENTS:

PREFACE

MY WATCH

POLITICAL ECONOMY

THE JUMPING FROG

JOURNALISM IN TENNESSEE

THE STORY OF THE BAD LITTLE BOY

THE STORY OF THE GOOD LITTLE BOY

A COUPLE OF POEMS BY TWAIN AND MOORE

NIAGARA

ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS

TO RAISE POULTRY

EXPERIENCE OF THE MCWILLIAMSES WITH MEMBRANOUS CROUP

MY FIRST LITERARY VENTURE

HOW THE AUTHOR WAS SOLD IN NEWARK

THE OFFICE BORE

JOHNNY GREER

THE FACTS IN THE CASE OF THE GREAT BEEF CONTRACT

THE CASE OF GEORGE FISHER

DISGRACEFUL PERSECUTION OF A BOY

THE JUDGES “SPIRITED WOMAN”

INFORMATION WANTED

SOME LEARNED FABLES, FOR GOOD OLD BOYS AND GIRLS

MY LATE SENATORIAL SECRETARYSHIP

A FASHION ITEM

RILEY-NEWSPAPER CORRESPONDENT

A FINE OLD MAN

SCIENCE vs. LUCK

THE LATE BENJAMIN FRANKLIN

MR. BLOKE’S ITEM

A MEDIEVAL ROMANCE

PETITION CONCERNING COPYRIGHT

AFTER-DINNER SPEECH

LIONIZING MURDERERS

A NEW CRIME

A CURIOUS DREAM

A TRUE STORY

THE SIAMESE TWINS

SPEECH AT THE SCOTTISH BANQUET IN LONDON

A GHOST STORY

THE CAPITOLINE VENUS

SPEECH ON ACCIDENT INSURANCE

JOHN CHINAMAN IN NEW YORK

HOW I EDITED AN AGRICULTURAL PAPER

THE PETRIFIED MAN

MY BLOODY MASSACRE

THE UNDERTAKER’S CHAT

CONCERNING CHAMBERMAIDS

AURELIA’S UNFORTUNATE YOUNG MAN

“AFTER” JENKINS

ABOUT BARBERS

“PARTY CRIES” IN IRELAND

THE FACTS CONCERNING THE RECENT RESIGNATION

HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF

HONORED AS A CURIOSITY

FIRST INTERVIEW WITH ARTEMUS WARD

CANNIBALISM IN THE CARS

THE KILLING OF JULIUS CAESAR “LOCALIZED”

THE WIDOW’S PROTEST

THE SCRIPTURAL PANORAMIST

CURING A COLD

A CURIOUS PLEASURE EXCURSION

RUNNING FOR GOVERNOR

A MYSTERIOUS VISIT

PREFACE

I have scattered through this volume a mass of matter which has never

been in print before (such as “Learned Fables for Good Old Boys and

Girls,” the “Jumping Frog restored to the English tongue after martyrdom

in the French,” the “Membranous Croup” sketch, and many others which I

need not specify): not doing this in order to make an advertisement of

it, but because these things seemed instructive.

HARTFORD, 1875.

MARK TWAIN.

SKETCHES NEW AND OLD

MY WATCH–[Written about 1870.]

AN INSTRUCTIVE LITTLE TALE

My beautiful new watch had run eighteen months without losing or gaining,

and without breaking any part of its machinery or stopping. I had come

to believe it infallible in its judgments about the time of day, and to

consider its constitution and its anatomy imperishable. But at last, one

night, I let it run down. I grieved about it as if it were a recognized

messenger and forerunner of calamity. But by and by I cheered up, set

the watch by guess, and commanded my bodings and superstitions to depart.

Next day I stepped into the chief jeweler’s to set it by the exact time,

and the head of the establishment took it out of my hand and proceeded to

set it for me. Then he said, “She is four minutes slow-regulator wants

pushing up.” I tried to stop him–tried to make him understand that the

watch kept perfect time. But no; all this human cabbage could see was

that the watch was four minutes slow, and the regulator must be pushed up

a little; and so, while I danced around him in anguish, and implored him

to let the watch alone, he calmly and cruelly did the shameful deed. My

watch began to gain. It gained faster and faster day by day. Within the

week it sickened to a raging fever, and its pulse went up to a hundred

and fifty in the shade. At the end of two months it had left all the

timepieces of the town far in the rear, and was a fraction over thirteen

days ahead of the almanac. It was away into November enjoying the snow,

while the October leaves were still turning. It hurried up house rent,

bills payable, and such things, in such a ruinous way that I could not

abide it. I took it to the watchmaker to be regulated. He asked me if I

had ever had it repaired. I said no, it had never needed any repairing.

He looked a look of vicious happiness and eagerly pried the watch open,

and then put a small dice-box into his eye and peered into its machinery.

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