Those Extraordinary Twins by Mark Twain

I am no judge of music, and I don’t claim it, but in my opinion nobody

can make those two songs go together right.”

“Why, ma, I thought–”

“It don’t make any difference what you thought, it can’t be done. They

tried it, and to my mind it was a failure. I never heard such a crazy

uproar; seemed to me, sometimes, the roof would come off; and as for the

cats–well, I’ve lived a many a year, and seen cats aggravated in more

ways than one, but I’ve never seen cats take on the way they took on last

night.”

“Well, I don’t think that that goes for anything, ma, because it is the

nature of cats that any sound that is unusual–”

“Unusual! You may well call it so. Now if they are going to sing duets

every night, I do hope they will both sing the same tune at the same

time, for in my opinion a duet that is made up of two different tunes is

a mistake; especially when the tunes ain’t any kin to one another, that

way.”

“But, ma, I think it must be a foreign custom; and it must be right too;

and the best way, because they have had every opportunity to know what is

right, and it don’t stand to reason that with their education they would

do anything but what the highest musical authorities have sanctioned.

You can’t help but admit that, ma.”

The argument was formidably strong; the old lady could not find any way

around it; so, after thinking it over awhile she gave in with a sigh of

discontent, and admitted that the daughter’s position was probably

correct. Being vanquished, she had no mind to continue the topic at that

disadvantage, and was about to seek a change when a change came of

itself. A footstep was heard on the stairs, and she said:

“There-he’s coming!”

“They, ma–you ought to say they–it’s nearer right.”

The new lodger, rather shoutingly dressed but looking superbly handsome,

stepped with courtly carnage into the trim little breakfast-room and put

out all his cordial arms at once, like one of those pocket-knives with a

multiplicity of blades, and shook hands with the whole family

simultaneously. He was so easy and pleasant and hearty that all

embarrassment presently thawed away and disappeared, and a cheery feeling

of friendliness and comradeship took its place. He–or preferably they

–were asked to occupy the seat of honor at the foot of the table. They

consented with thanks, and carved the beefsteak with one set of their

hands while they distributed it at the same time with the other set.

“Will you have coffee, gentlemen, or tea?”

“Coffee for Luigi, if you please, madam, tea for me.”

“Cream and sugar?”

“For me, yes, madam; Luigi takes his coffee, black. Our natures differ a

good deal from each other, and our tastes also.”

The first time the negro girl Nancy appeared in the door and saw the two

heads turned in opposite directions and both talking at once, then saw

the commingling arms feed potatoes into one mouth and coffee into the

other at the same time, she had to pause and pull herself out of a

faintness that came over her; but after that she held her grip and was

able to wait on the table with fair courage.

Conversation fell naturally into the customary grooves. It was a little

jerky, at first, because none of the family could get smoothly through a

sentence without a wabble in it here and a break there, caused by some

new surprise in the way of attitude or gesture on the part of the twins.

The weather suffered the most. The weather was all finished up and

disposed of, as a subject, before the simple Missourians had gotten

sufficiently wonted to the spectacle of one body feeding two heads to

feel composed and reconciled in the presence of so bizarre a miracle.

And even after everybody’s mind became tranquilized there was still one

slight distraction left: the hand that picked up a biscuit carried it to

the wrong head, as often as any other way, and the wrong mouth devoured

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