Latest / Mark Twain Classics Podcast / Curious Dream and Other Sketches - Mark Twain

Transcript

Curious Dream and Other Sketches - Mark Twain · Mark Twain Classics Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Section one of A Curious Dream and Other Sketches by
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Mark Twain. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer,
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: please visit LibriVox dot org. Read by Ben Tucker, A
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Curious Dream and Other Sketches by Mark Twain. A Curious
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: Dream containing a moral Night before last, I had a
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: singular dream. I seemed to be sitting on a door
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: step in no particular city, perhaps ruminating, and the time
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: of night appeared to be about twelve or one o'clock.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: The weather was balmy and delicious. There was no human
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: sound in the air, not even a footstep. There was
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: no sound of any kind to emphasize the dead stillness,
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: except the occasional hollow barking of a dog in the distance,
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: and the fainter answer of a further dog present lee
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: up the street. I heard a bony clack clacking, and
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: guessed it was the castanets of a serenading party. In
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: a minute more, a tall skeleton, hooded and half clad
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: in a tattered and moldy shroud, whose shreds were flapping
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: about the ribby lattice work of its person swung by
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: me with a stately stride, and disappeared in the gray
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: gloom of the starlight. It had a broken and worm
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: eaten coffin on its shoulder and a bundle of something
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: in its hand. I knew what the clack clacking was.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: Then it was this party's joints working together, and his
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: elbows knocking against his sides as he walked. I may
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: say I was surprised. Before I could collect my thoughts
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: and enter upon any speculations as to what this apparition
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: might portend, I heard another one coming, for I recognized
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: his clack clack. He had two thirds of a coffin
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: on his shoulder, and some foot and head boards under
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: his arm. I mightily wanted to peer under his hood
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: and speak to him, But when he turned and smiled
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: upon me with his cavernous sockets and his projecting grin
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: as he went by, I thought I would not detain him.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: He was hardly gone when I heard the clacking again,
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: and another one issued from the shadowy half light. This
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: one was bending under a heavy gravestone and dragging a
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: shabby coffin after him by a string. When he got
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: to me, he gave me a steady look for a
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: moment or two, and then rounded two and backed up
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: to me, saying, ease this down for a fellow, will you.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: I eased the gravestone down till it rested on the ground,
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: and in doing so noticed that it bore the name
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: of John Baxter Copmanhurst, with May eighteen thirty nine as
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: the date of his death. Deceased, sat wearily down by me,
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: and wiped his os frontis with his major mac sillery,
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: chiefly from former habit I judged, for I could not
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: see that he brought away any perspiration. It is too bad,
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: too bad, said he, drawing the remnant of the shroud
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: about him and leaning his jaw pensively on his hand.
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: Then he put his left foot up on his knee
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: and fell to scratching his ankle bone absently with a
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: rusty nail, which he got out of his coffin. What
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: is too bad? Friend? Oh? Everything? Everything? I almost wish
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: I never had died. You surprise me? Why do you
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: say this has anything gone wrong? What is the matter matter?
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: Look at this shroud rags, Look at this gravestone all
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: battered up, Look at that disgraceful old coffin all a
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: man's property going to ruin and destruction before his eyes,
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: and ask him if anything is wrong, fire and brimstone.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: Calm yourself, Calm yourself, I said, it is too bad.
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: It is certainly too bad. But then I had not
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: supposed that you would much mind such matters situated as
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: you are. Well, my dear sir, I do mind them.
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: My pride is hurt and my comfort is impaired, destroyed.
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: I might say, I will state my case. I will
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: put it to you in such a way that you
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: can comprehend it, if you will let me, said the
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: poor skeleton, tilting the hood of his shroud back as
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: if he were clearing for action, and thus unconsciously giving
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: himself a jaunty and festive are very much at variance
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: with the grave character of his position in life, so
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: to speak, and in prominent contrast with his distressful mood.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: Proceed said I I reside in the shameful old graveyard
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: a block or two above you here in this street. There. Now,
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: I just expected that cartilage would let go. Third rip
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: from the bottom, friend, hitch the end of it to
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: my spine with a string. If you have got such
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: a thing about you, though a bit of silver wires
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: a deal pleasanter and more durable and becoming if one
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: keeps it polished. To think of shredding out and going
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: to pieces in this way, just on account of the
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: indifference and neglect of one's posterity. And the poor ghost
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: grated his teeth in a way that gave me a
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: wrench and a shiver, for the effect is mightily increased
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: by the absence of muffling flesh and cuticle. I reside
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: in that old graveyard, and have for these thirty years,
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: and I tell you things are changed since I first
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: laid this old tired frame there, and turned over and
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: stretched out for a long sleep, with a delicious sense
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: upon me of being done with bother and grief and
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: anxiety and doubt and fear for ever and ever, and
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: listening with comfortable and increasing satisfaction to the sexton's work,
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: from the startling clatter of his first spade full on
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: my coffin till it dulled away, to the faint patting
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: that shaped the roof of my new home. Delicious, my,
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: I wish you could try it to night, And out
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: of my reverie deceased fetched me with a rattling slap
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: with a bony hand. Yes, sir, thirty years ago. I
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: laid me down there and was happy. For it was
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: out in the country then out in the breezy, flowery,
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: grand old woods, and the lazy winds gossiped with the leaves,
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: and the squirrels capered over us and around us, and
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: the creeping things visited us, and the birds filled the
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: tranquil solitude with music. Ah, it was worth ten years
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: of a man's life to be dead. Then everything was pleasant.
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: I was in a good neighborhood, for all the dead
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: people that lived near me belonged to the best families
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: in the city. Our posterity appeared to think the world
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: of us. They kept our graves in the very best condition.
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: The fences were always in faultless repair. Head Boards were
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: kept painted or whitewashed, and were replaced with new ones
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: as soon as they began to look rusty or decayed.
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: Monuments were kept upright, railings intact and bright, the rose
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: bushes and shrubbery trimmed, trained and free from blemish, the
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: walks clean and smooth and graveled. That day is gone by.
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: Our descendants have forgotten us. My grandson lives in a
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: stately house built with money made by these old hands
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: of mine. Then I sleep in a neglected grave with
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: invading vermin that gnaw my shroud to build them nests
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: withal I and friends that lie with me founded and
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: secured the prosperity of this fine city, and the stately
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: bantling of our loves leaves us to rot in a
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: dilapidated cemetery, which neighbors curse, and strangers scoff at. See
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: the difference between the old time and this. For instance,
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: our graves are all caved in now, our head boards
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: havetted away and tumbled down. Our railings reel this way
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: and that with one foot in the air after a
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: fashion of unseemly levity. Our monuments lean warily, and our
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: gravestones bow their heads discouraged. There be no adornments any more,
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: no roses, nor shrubs, nor graveled walks, nor anything that
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: is a comfort to the eye. And even the paintless
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: old board fence that did make a show of holding
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: us sacred from companionship with beasts and the defilement of
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: heedless feet, has tottered till it overhangs the street, and
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: only advertises the presence of our dismal resting place and
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: invites yet more derision to it. And now we cannot
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: hide our poverty and catters and friendly woods, for the
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: city has stretched its withering arms abroad and taken us in.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: And all that remains of the cheer of our old
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: home is the cluster of lagos obrious forest trees that
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: stand bored and wearied of city life, with their feet
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: in our coffins, looking into the hazy distance and wishing
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: they were there. I tell you it is disgraceful. You
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: begin to comprehend, You begin to see how it is
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: while our descendants are living sumptuously on our money. Right
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: around us in the city, we have to fight hard
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: to keep skull and bones together. Bless you. There isn't
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: a grave in our cemetery that doesn't leak, not one.
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: Every time it rains in the night, we have to
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: climb out and roost in the trees, and sometimes we
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: are wakened suddenly by the chilly water trickling down the
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: back of our necks. Then I tell you there is
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: a general heaving up of old graves, and kicking over
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: of old monuments, and scampering of old skeletons for the trees,
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: bless me. If you had gone along there some such
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: nights after twelve, you might have seen as many as
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: fifteen of us roosting on one limb, with our joints
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: rattling drearily in the wind, wheezing through our ribs. Many
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: a time we've perched there for three or four dreary hours,
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: and then come down stiff and chilled through and drowsy,
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: and borrowed each other's skulls to bail out our graves with.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: If you will glance up in my mouth now, as
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: I tilt my head back, you can see that my
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: head piece is half full of old dry sediment. How
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: top heavy and stupid it makes me sometimes, Yes, sir,
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: many a time, if you had happened to come along
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: just before the dawn, you have caught us baling out
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: the graves and hanging our shrouds on the fence to dry.
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: Why I had an elegant shroud stolen from there one morning?
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: Think a party by the name of Smith took it.
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: That resides in a Plebeian graveyard over yonder. I think
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: so because the first time I ever saw him, he
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: hadn't anything on but a checked shirt. And the last
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: time I saw him, which was at a social gathering
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: in the new Cemetery, he was the best dressed corpse
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: in the company, and it is a significant fact that
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: he left when he saw me. And presently an old
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: woman from here missed her coffin. She generally took it
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: with her when she went anywhere, because she was liable
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: to take cold and bring on the spasmodic rheumatism that
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: originally killed her if she exposed herself to the night
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: air much. She was named Hotchkiss, Anna Matilda Hotchkiss, you
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: might know her. She has two upper front teeth, is tall,
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: but a good deal inclined to stoop one rib on
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: the left side gone, has one shred of rusty hair
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: hanging from the left side of her head, and one
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: little tuft just above and a little forward of her
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: right ear. Has her under jaw wired on one side
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: where it had worked, loose small bone of left forearm
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: gone lost in a fight. Has a kind of swagger
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: in her gait and a gallous way going with her
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: arms akimbo and her nostrils in the air. Has been
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: pretty free and easy, and is all damaged and battered
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: up till she looks like a queensware crate in ruins.
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: Maybe you have met her, God forbid, I involuntarily ejaculated,
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: for somehow I was not looking for that form of question,
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: and it caught me a little off my guard. But
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: I hastened to make amends for my rudeness and say,
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: I simply meant I had not had the honor, for
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: I would not deliberately speak discourteously of a friend of yours.
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: You were saying that you were robbed, and it was
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: a shame too. But it appears by what is left
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: of the shroud you have on that it was a
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: costly one in its day. How did a most ghastly
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: expression began to develop among the decayed features and shriveled
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: intoguments of my guest's face? And I was beginning to
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: grow uneasy and distressed when he told me he was
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: only working up a deep, sly smile with a wink
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: in it to suggest that about the time he acquired
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: his present garment a ghost in a neighboring cemetery. Mist one.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: This reassured me, but I begged him to confine himself
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: to speech thenceforth, because his facial expression was uncertain. Even
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: with the most elaborate care, it was liable to miss fire.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: Smiling should especially be avoided. What he might honestly consider
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: a shining success was likely to strike me in a
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: very different light. I said, I liked to see a
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: skeleton cheerful, even decorously playful, But I did not think
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: smiling was a skeleton's best hold. Yes, friend, said, the
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: poor skeleton. The facts are just as I have given
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: them to you. Two of these old graveyards, the one
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: that I resided in and one further along, have been
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: deliberately neglected by our descendants of to day until there
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: is no occupying them any longer, aside from the osteological
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: discomfort of it. And that is no light matter this
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: rainy weather. The present state of things is ruinous to property.
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: We have got to move or be content to see
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: our effects wasted away and utterly destroyed. Now you will
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: hardly believe it, but it is true, nevertheless, that there
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: isn't a single coffin in good repair among all my acquaintance.
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: Now that is an absolute fact. I do not refer
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: to low people who come in a pine box mounted
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: on an express wagon, but I am talking about your
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: high toned, silver mounted burial case monumental sort that travel
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: under black plumes at the head of a procession and
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: have choice of cemetery lots. I mean folks like the
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: Jarvises and the Bledsoes, and Burlings and such. They are
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: all about ruined. The most substantial people in our set.
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: They were, and now look at them, a utterly used up,
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: in poverty stricken. One of the bled Sols actually traded
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: his monument to a late bar keeper for some fresh
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: shavings to put under his head. I tell you it
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: speaks volumes. For there is nothing a corpse takes so
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: much pride in as his monument. He loves to read
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: the inscription. He comes after a while to believe what
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: it says himself, and then you may see him sitting
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: on the fence night after night, enjoying it. Epitaphs are cheap,
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: and they do a poor chap a world of good
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: after he is dead, especially if he had heard luck
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: while he was alive. I wish they were used more now.
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: I don't complain, but confidentially I do think it was
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: a little shabby in my descendants to give me nothing
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: but this old slab of a gravestone, and all the
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: more that there isn't a compliment on it. It used
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: to have gone to his just reward on it, And
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: I was proud when I first saw it. But by
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: by and by I noticed that whenever an old friend
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: of mine came along, he would hook his chin on
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: the railing and pull a long face and read along
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: down till he came to that, and then he would
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: chuckle to himself and walk off, looking satisfied and comfortable.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: So I scratched it off to get rid of those fools.
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: But a dead man always takes a deal of pride
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: in his monument. Yonder goes half a dozen of the
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: jarvises now with the family monument along and Smithers and
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: some hired specters went by with his a while ago.
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: Hello Higgins, goodbye, old friend. That's Meredith Higgins died in
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: forty four. Belongs to our set in the cemetery. Fine
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: old family. Great grandmother was an injun. I am on
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: the most familiar terms with him. He didn't hear me.
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: Was the reason he didn't answer me. And I am
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: sorry too, because I would have liked to introduce you.
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: You would admire him. He is the most disjointed, sway backed,
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: and generally distorted old skeleton you ever saw. But he
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: is full of fun. When he laughs, it sounds like
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: rasping two stones together, and he always starts it off
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: with a cheery screech, like raking a nail across a
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: window pane. Hey Jones, that's all. Columbus Jones shrout costs
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: four hundred dollars entire trousseau, including monument, twenty seven hundred.
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: This was in the spring of twenty six. It was
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: enormous style for those days. Dead people came all the
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: way from the alleghenies to see his things. The party
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: that occupied the grave next to mine remembers it well.
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: Now do you see that individual going along with a
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: piece of a headboard under his arm, one leg bone
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: below his knee gone, and not a thing in the
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: world on that is Barstow dollhouse, And next to Columbus Jones,
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: he was the most sumptuously outfitted person that ever entered
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: our cemetery. We are all leaving. We cannot tolerate the
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: treatment we are receiving at the hands of our descendant.
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: They open new cemeteries, but they leave us to our agnominee.
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: They mend the streets, but they never mend anything that
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: is about us or belongs to us. Look at that
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: coffin of mine, yet, I tell you, in its day
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: it was a piece of furniture that would have attracted
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: attention in any drawing room in this city. You may
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: have it if you want it. I can't afford her apair.
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: It put an new bottom in her and part of
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: a new top, and a bit of fresh lining along
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: the left side, and you'll find her about as comfortable
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: as any receptacle of her species you ever tried. No, thanks, No,
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: don't mention it. You have been civil to me, and
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: I would give you all the property I've got before
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: I would seem ungrateful. Now, this winding sheet is a
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: kind of a sweet thing in its way. If you
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: would like to no, well, just as you say, But
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: I wish to be fair and liberal. There is nothing
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: mean about me. Good Bye, friend, I must be going.
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: I may have a good way to go to night, don't.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: I only know one thing per certain, and that is
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: that I'm on the emigrant trail now, and I'll never
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: sleep in that crazy old cemetery again. I will travel
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: till I find respectable quarters. If I have to hoof
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: it to New Jersey, all the boys are going. It
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: was decided in public conclave last night to emigrate, and
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: by the time the sun rises there won't be a
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: bone left in our old habitations. Such cemeteries may suit
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: my surviving friends, but they do not suit the remains
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: that have the honor to make these remarks. My opinion
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: is the general opinion. If you doubt it, go and
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: see how the departing ghosts upset things. Before they started,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: they were almost riotous in their demonstrations of distaste. Hello,
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: here are some of the Bledsos, And if you will
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: give me a lift with this tombstone, I guess I
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: will join company and jog along with them. Mighty respectable
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: old family, the Bledsos, and used to always come out
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: in six horse hearses and all that sort of thing.
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: Fifty years ago, when I walked these streets in daylight,
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: good bye friend, and with his gravestone on his shoulder,
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: he joined the grisly procession, dragging his damaged coffin after him.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: For notwithstanding he pressed it upon me so earnestly, I
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: utterly refused his hospitality. I suppose that for as much
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: as two hours, these sad outcasts went clacking by, laden
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: with their dismal effects, and all that time I sat
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: pitying them. One or two of the youngest and least
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: dilapidated among them inquired about midnight trains on the railways,
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: but the rest seemed unacquainted with that mode of travel,
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: and merely asked about common public roads to various towns
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: and cities, some of which are not on the map
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: now and vanish from it and from the earth as
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: much as thirty years ago. And some few of them
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: never had existed anywhere but on maps and private ones
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: and real estate agencies at that. And they asked about
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: the condition of the cemeteries in these towns and cities,
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: and about the reputation the citizens bore as to reverence
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: for the dead. This whole matter interested me deeply, and
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: likewise compelled my sympathy for these homeless ones. And it
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: all seemed real, and I, not knowing it was a dream,
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: I mentioned to one shrouded wanderer an idea that had
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: entered my head to publish an account of this curious
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: and very sorrowful exodus, But said also that I could
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: not describe it truthfully and just as it occurred, without
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: seeming to trifle with a grave subject and exhibit an
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: irreverence for the dead that would shock and distress their
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: surviving friends. But this bland and stately remnant of a
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: former citizen leaned him far over my gate and whispered
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: in my ear, and said, do not let that disturb you.
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: The community that can stand such graveyards as those we
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: are emigrating from, can stand anything a body can say
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: about the neglected and saken dead that lie in them.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: At that very moment, a cock crowed, and the weird
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: procession vanished and left not a shred or a bone behind.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: I awoke and found myself lying with my head out
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: of the bed and sagging downwards considerably, a position favorable
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: to dreaming. Dreams with morals in them, maybe, but not poetry.
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: Note the reader is assured that if the cemeteries in
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: his town are kept in good order, this dream is
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: not leveled at his town at all, but is leveled
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: particularly and venomously at the next town. End of Section one,
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: Section two of A Curious Dream and Other Sketches by
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: Mark Twain. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: a new Beecher church. If the reverend mister Smith, or
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: the reverend mister Dad Jones, or the reverend mister Brown,
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: we're about to build a new church edifice, it would
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: be projected on the same old pattern and be like
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: pretty much all the other churches in the country. And
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: so I would naturally mention it as a new Presbyterian church,
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: or a new Methodist or a new Baptist church, and
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: never think of calling it by the pastor's name. But
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: when a beacher projects a church, that edifice is necessarily
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: going to be something entirely fresh and original. It is
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: not going to be like any other church in the world.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: It is going to be as variegated, eccentric, and marked
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: with as peculiar in striking an individuality as a beacher himself.
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: It is going to have a deal more Beacher in
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: it than any one narrow creed can fit into without rattling,
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: or any one arbitrary order of architecture can symmetrically enclose
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: and cover. Consequently, to call it simply a congregational churcho
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: not to give half an idea of the thing. There
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: is only one word broad enough and wide enough and
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: deep enough to take in the whole affair and express
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: it cleanly, luminously, and concisely. And that is Beecher. The
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: projected edifice I am about to speak of is therefore
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: properly named in my caption as a new Beecher Church.
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: The projector is the Reverend Thomas K. Beecher, brother of
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: the other one. Of course I never knew, but one
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: beacher that wasn't and he was a nephew. The new
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: church is to be built in Elmira, New York, where
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: mister B has been preaching to one in the same
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: congregation for the last sixteen years, and is thoroughly esteemed
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: and beloved by his people. I have had the opportunity
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: to hear all about the new church, for I have
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: lately been visiting in Elmira. Now, when one has that
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: disease which gives its possessor the title of humorist, he
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: must make oath to his statements, else the public will
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: not believe him. Therefore, I make solemn oath that what
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: I am going to tell about the new church is
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: the strict truth. The main building, for there are to
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: be three masts together in a large grassy square ornamented
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: with quite a forest of shade trees will be the
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: church proper. It will be lofty in order to secure
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: good air and ventilation. The auditorium will be circular, an
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: amphitheater after the ordinary pattern of an opera house without galleries.
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: It is to seat a thousand persons on one side
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: or one end, if you choose, will be an ample
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: raised platform for the minister, the rear half of which
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: will be occupied by the organ and the choir. Before
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: the minister will be the circling amphitheater of pews, the
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: first thirty or forty on the level floor, and the
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: next rising and graduated tiers to the walls. The seats
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: on the level floor will be occupied by the aged
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: and infirm, who can enter the church through a hall
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: under the speaker's platform without climbing any stairs. The people
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: occupying the raised tiers will enter by a dozen doors
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: opening into the church from a lobby like an opera
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: house lobby, and descend the various aisles to their places.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: In case of fire or earthquakes, these numerous exits will
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: be convenient and useful. No space is to be wasted
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: under the raised tiers of pews are to be stalls
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: for horses and carriages, so that these may be sheltered
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: from sun and rain. There will be twenty four of
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: these stalls. Each stall to be entered by an arch
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: of ornamental masonry, no doors to open or shut. Consequently,
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: the outside base of the church will have a formidable
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: portholed look like a man of war. The stalls are
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: to be so mailed with deadeners, and so thoroughly plastered
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: that neither sound nor smell can ascend to the church
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: and offend the worshipers. The horses will be in attendance
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: at church, but an hour or two at a time,
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: of course, and can defile the stalls but little. An
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: immediate cleansing after they leave is to set that all
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: right again. There is to be no steeple on the church,
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: merely because no practical use can be made of it.
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: There is to be no bell, because all men know
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: what time church service begins without that exasperating nuisance. An
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: explanation of this remark, I will state that at home
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: I suffer in the vicinity and under the distracting clinger
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: of thirteen church bells, all of whom is that right
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: clamor at once and No. Two in a court. A
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: large part of my time is taken up in devising
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: cruel and unusual sufferings, and in fancy inflicting them on
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: those bell ringers, and having a good time. The second
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: building is to be less lofty than the church, is
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: to be built right against the rear of it, and
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: communicate with it by a door. It is to have
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: two stories. On the first floor will be three distinct
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: Sunday school rooms, all large, but one considerably larger than
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: the other two. The Sunday school connected with mister Beecher's
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: Church has always been a graded one in each department
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: singularly thorough in its grade of instruction. The pupil wins
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: his advancement to the higher grades by hard won proficiency,
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: not by mere added years. The largest of the three
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: compartments will be used as the main Sunday school room
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: and for the week day evening lecture. The whole upper
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: story of this large building will be well lighted and
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: ventilated and occupied wholly. Is a play room for the
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: children of the church, and it will stand open and
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: welcome to them through all the week days. They can
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: fill it with their playthings if they choose, and Besides,
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: it will be furnished with dumb bells, swings, rocking horses,
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: and all such matters as children delight in. The idea
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: is to make a child look upon a church as
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: only another home, and a sunny one, rather than as
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: a dismal exile or a prison. The third building will
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: be less lofty than the second. It will adjoin the
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: rear of the second and communicate with it by a
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: door or doors. It will consist of three stories, like
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: the other two buildings, that will cover considerable ground. On
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: the first floor will be the church parlors, where the
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: usual social gatherings of modern congregations are held. On the
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: same floor, and opening into the parlors will be a
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: reception room and also a circulating library, a free library,
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: not simply free to the church membership, but to everybody,
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: just as is the present library of mister Beecher's church.
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: And few libraries are more extensively and more diligently and
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: gratefully used than this one. Also on this first floor,
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: in communicating with the parlors, will be till it not
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: in goth publish it not in Ascaluen. Six bathrooms, hot
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: and cold water, free tickets issue to any applicant among
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: the unclean of the congregation. The ideas sound and sensible.
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: For this reason, many members of all congregations have no
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: good bathing facilities, and are not able to pay for
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: them at the barber shops without feeling the expense. And
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: yet a luxurious bath is a thing that all civilized
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: beings greatly enjoy and derive helpful benefit from. The church
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: buildings are to be heated by steam, and consequently the
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: waste steam can be very judiciously utilized in the proposed bathrooms.
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: And speaking of this bathroom project, I have revealed a
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: state secret, but I never could keep one of any
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: kind estate or otherwise. Even the congregation were not to
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: know of this matter. The building committee were to leave
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: it unmentioned in their report. But I got hold of it,
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: and from a member of that committee too, and I
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: had rather part with one of my hind legs than
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: keep still about it. The bathrooms are unquestionably to be built,
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: and so why not tell it. In the second story
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: of this third building will be the permanent residence of
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: the church missionary, a lady who constantly looks after the
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: poor and sick of the church. Also a set of
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: lodging and living rooms for the janitors or genitresses, for
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: they will be women, mister Beecher, holding that women are
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: tightier and more efficient in such a position than men,
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: and that they ought to dwell upon the premises and
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: give them their undivided care. Also on this second floor
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: are to be six rooms to do duty as a
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: church infirmary for the sick pore of the congregation. This church,
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: having always supported and taken care of its own unfortunates,
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: instead of leaving them to the public charity. In the
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: infirmary will be kept one or two water beds for
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: invalids whose pains will not allow them to lie on
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: a less yielding substance, and half a dozen reclining invalid
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: chairs on wheels. The water beds and invalid chairs at
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: present belonging to the church are always in demand and
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: never out of service. Part of the appurtenances of the
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: new church will be a horse and an easy vehicle,
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: to be kept and driven by a janitor, and used
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: wholly forgiving the churches indigent invalids air and exercise. It
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: is found that such an establishment is daily needed, so
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: much so indeed, as to almost amount to a church necessity.
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: The third story of this third building is to be
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: occupied as the church kitchen, and it is sensibly placed aloft,
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: so that the ascending noises and boarding house smells shall
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: go up and aggravate the birds instead of the saints,
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: except such of the latter as are above the clouds,
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: and they can easily keep out of the way of it.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: No doubt, dumb waiters will carry the food down to
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: the church parlors instead of up. Why is it that
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: nobody has thought of the simple wisdom of this arrangement before?
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: Is it for a church to step forward and tell
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: us how to get rid of kitchen smells and noises.
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: If it be asked why the new church will need
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: a kitchen, I remind the reader of the infirmary occupants,
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: et cetera. They must eat, and besides, social gatherings of
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: members of this congregation meet at the church parlors as
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: often as three and four evenings a week, and so
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: drink tea and g G. It commences with G, I think,
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: but somehow I cannot think of the word. The new
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: church parlors will be large, and it is intended that
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: these social gatherings shall be promoted and encouraged, and that
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: they shall take an added phrase Viza VI. When several
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: families want to indulge in a little reunion and have
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: not room in their small houses at home, they can
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: have it in the church parlors. You will notice in
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: every feature of this new church one predominant idea and
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: purpose always discernible, the banding together of the congregation as
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: a family, and the making of the church a home.
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: You see it in the play room, the library, the parlors,
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: the baths, the infirmary. It is everywhere. It is the
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: great central ruling idea. To entirely consummate such a thing
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: would be impossible with nearly any other congregation in the Union.
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: But after sixteen years of molding and teaching, mister Beecher
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: has made it wholly possible and practicable with this one.
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: It is not stretching metaphor too far to say that
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: he is the father of his people, and his church
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: their mother. If the new Church project is a curiosity,
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: it is still but an inferior curiosity compared to the
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: plan of raising the money for it. One could have told,
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: with his eyes shut and one hand tied behind him,
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: that it originated with a beacher, I was going to
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: say with a lunatic, but the success of the plan
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: robs me of the opportunity. When it was decided to
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: build a new church edifice at a cost of not
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: less than forty thousand dollars nor more than fifty thousand dollars.
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: For the membership is not three hundred and fifty strong,
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: and there are not six men in it who can
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: strictly be called rich. Mister Beecher gave to each member
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: a printed circular worded as follows, each circular enclosed in
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: an envelope, prepaid and addressed to himself, to be returned
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: through the Post office confidential. It is proposed to build
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: a meeting house and other rooms for the use of
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: the church. To do this work honestly and well, it
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: is proposed to spend one year in raising a part
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: of the money in advance, and in getting plans and
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: making contracts. One year of plans in contracts April first,
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: eighteen seventy one to eighteen seventy two, Build and cover
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: in April first, eighteen seventy two to eighteen seventy three, Plaster,
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: finish and furnish April first, eighteen seventy three to eighteen
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: seventy four, pay for in full, and dedicate April first,
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: eighteen seventy four to eighteen seventy five. It is proposed
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: to expend not less than twenty thousand dollars nor more
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: than fifty thousand according to the ability shown by the
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: returns of these cards of confidential subscription. Any member of
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: the church and congregation, or any friend of the church
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: is allowed and invited to subscribe, but no one is
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: urged t k beecher pastor to help build our meetinghouse.
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: I think I shall be able to give not less
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: than blank dollars and not more than blank dollars each
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: year for four years beginning April first, eighteen seventy one.
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: Or I can make in one payment blank dollars, trusting
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: in the Lord to help me, I hereby subscribe the
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: same as noted above name residence. These subscriptions were to
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: be wholly voluntary and strictly confidential. No one was to
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: know the amount of a man's subscription except himself and
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: the minister. Nobody was urged to give anything at all.
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: All were simply invited to give whatever sum they felt
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: was right and just. From ten cents upward, and no
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: questions asked, no criticisms made, no revealments uttered. There was
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: no possible chance for glory, for even though a man
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: gave his whole fortune, nobody would ever know it. I
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: do not know when anything has struck me as being
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: so utopian, so absurdly romantic, so ignorant on its face
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: of human nature, and so anybody would have thought parties
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: said mister Beecher had educated his people, and that each
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: would give as he privately felt able, did not bother
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: about the glory. I believed human nature to be a
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: more potent educator than any minister, and that the result
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: would show it. But I was wrong. At the end
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: of a month or two, some two thirds of the
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: circulars had wended back one by one to the pastor,
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: silently and secretly through the post office, and then, without
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: mentioning the name of any giver or the amount of
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: his gift, mister Beecher announced from the pulpit that all
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: the money needed was pledged, the certain amount being over
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: forty five thousand dollars and the possible amount over fifty
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: three thousand dollars. When the remainder of the circulars have
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: come in it is confidently expected and believed that they
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: will add to these amounts a sum of not less
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: than ten thousand dollars. A great many subscriptions from children
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: and working men consisted of cash enclosures, ranging from a
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: ten cent currency stamp up to five, ten and fifteen dollars.
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: As I said before, the plan of levying the building
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: tax and the success of the plan are much more
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: curious and surprising than the exceedingly curious edifice. The money
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: is to create the reason the monies are to be
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: paid in for annual installments. For that is, the plan
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: is partly to make the payments easy, but chiefly because
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: the church is to be substantially built and its several
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: parts allowed time to settle in season, each in its turn.
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: For instance, the substructures will be allowed a good part
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: of the first year to settle and compact themselves. After completion,
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: the walls the second year, and so forth and so on.
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: There is to be no work done by contract, and
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: no unseasoned wood used. The materials are to be sound
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: and good, and honest and competent conscientious workmen. Beecher says,
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: there are such the opinion of the world to the contrary, notwithstanding,
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: hired at full wages by the day to put them together.
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: The above statements are all true and genuine, according to
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: the oath I have already made there too, in which
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: I am now about to repeat, but for a notary
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: in legal form with my hand upon the book. Consequently,
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: we are going to have at least one sensible, but
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: very very curious church in America. I am aware that
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: I had no business to tell all these matters, but
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: the reporter instinct was strong upon me, and I could
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: not help it. And besides, they were in everybody's mouth
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: in Elmira. Anyway, into section two Section three of A
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: Curious Dream and other sketches by Mark Twain, the LibriVox
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: recordings in the public domain my late senatorial secretaryship. I
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: am not a private secretary to a senator any more. Now.
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: I held the birth two months in security and in
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: great cheerfulness of spirit. But my bread began to return
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: from over the waters. Then, that is to say, my
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: works came back and revealed themselves. I judged it best
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: to resign. The way of it was this my employer
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: sent for me one morning, tolerably early, and as soon
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: as I had finished inserting some conundrums clandestinely into his
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: last great speech. Upon finance, I entered the presence. There
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: was something portentous in his appearance. His cravat was untied,
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: his hair was in a state of disorder, and his
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: countenance bore about it the signs of a suppressed storm.
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: He held a package of letters in his tense grasp,
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: and I knew that the dreaded Pacific mail was in.
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: He said, I thought you were worthy of confidence. I said, yes, sir.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: He said, I gave you a letter from certain of
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: my constituents in the state of Nevada, asking the establishment
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: of a post office at Baldwin's Ranch, and told you
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: to answer it as ingeniously as you could, with arguments
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: which should persuade them that there was no real necessity
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: for an office at that place. I felt easier. Oh,
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: that is all, sir. I did do that, Yes you did.
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: I will read your answer for your own humiliation. Washington,
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: November twenty fourth, Messrs Smith, Jones and others. Gentlemen, what
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: the mischief do you suppose you want with a post
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: office at Baldwin's Ranch? It would not do you any
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: good if any letters came there. You couldn't read them,
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: you know. And besides, such letters as ought to pass
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: through with money in them for other localities would not
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: be likely to get through. You must perceive it once,
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: and that would make trouble for us. All. No, don't
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: bother about a post office in your camp. I have
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: your best interests at heart and feel that it would
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: only be an ornamental folly. What you want is a
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: nice jail, you know, a nice substantial jail, and a
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: free school. These will be a lasting benefit to you.
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: These will make you really contented and happy. I will
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: move in the matter at once, very truly, et cetera.
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: Mark Twain for James W. N u S. Senator. That
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: is the way you answered that letter. Those people say
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: they will hang me if I ever enter that district again.
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: I'm perfectly satisfied they will too. Well, Sir, I did
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: not know I was doing any harm. I only wanted
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: to convince them. Ah, well, you did convince them. I
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: make no manner of doubt. Now here is another specimen.
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: I gave you a petition from certain gentlemen of Nevada
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: praying that I would get a bill through Congress incorporating
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: the Methodist Episcopal Church of the State of Nevada. I
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: told you to say in reply that the creation of
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: such a law came more properly within the province of
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: the state legislature, and to endeavor to show them that
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: in the present feebleness of the religious element in that
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: new commonwealth, the expediency of incorporating the church was questionable.
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: What did you write? Washington, November twenty fourth, Reverend John
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: Halifax and others, gentlemen, you will have to go to
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: the state legislature about that speculation of yours. Congress don't
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: know anything about religion. But don't you hurry to go
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: there either, because this thing you propose to do out
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: in that new country isn't expedient. In fact, it is ridiculous.
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: Your religious people there too feeble in intellect and morality
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: and piety in everything. Pretty much, you'd better drop this.
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: You can't make it work. You can't issue stock on
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: an incorporation like that, or if you could, it would
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: only keep you in trouble all the time. The other
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: denominations would abuse it and bear it, and sell it
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: short and break it down. They would do with it
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: just as they would with one of your silver mines
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: out there. They would try to make all the world
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: believe it was a wildcat. You ought not to do
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: anything that is calculated to bring a sacred thing into disrepute.
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: You ought to be ashamed of yourselves. That is what
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: I think about it. You close your petition with the
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: words and we will ever pray. I think you had better.
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: You need to do it very truly. Cetera. Mark Twain
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: for James W. N Us, Senator, that luminous epistle finishes
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: me with the religious element among my constituents, but that
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: my political murder might be made sure. Some evil instinct
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: prompted me to hand you this memorial from the grave
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: company of elders composing the Board of Aldermen of the
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: City of San Francisco. To try your hand upon a
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: memorial praying that the cities write to the water lots
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: upon the city front might be established by law of Congress.
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: I told you this was a dangerous matter to move in.
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: I told you to write a non committal letter to
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: the Alderman, an ambiguous letter, a letter that should avoid,
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: as far as possible, all real consideration and discussion of
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: the water lot in question. If there is any feeling
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: left in you, any shame. Surely this letter you wrote
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: in obedience to that order, ought to evoke it when
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: its words fall upon your ears. Washington, November twenty seventh,
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: The Honorable Board of Aldermen et cetera, gentlemen, George Washington,
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: the revered father of his country, is dead. His long
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: and brilliant career is closed alas forever. He was greatly
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: respected in this section of the country, and his untimely
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: decease cast a gloom over the whole community. He died
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: on the fourteenth day of December seventeen ninety nine, passed
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: peacefully away from the scene of his honors and his
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: great achievements. The most lamented hero and the best beloved
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: that ever earth hath yielded unto death at such a
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: time as this. You speak of water lots, What a
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: lot was his? What is fame? Fame? As an accident?
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: Sir Isaac Newton discovered an apple falling to the ground,
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: A trivial discovery, truly, and one which a million men
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: had made before him. But his parents were influential, and
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: so they tortured that small circumstance into something wonderful and
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: lo the simple world took up the shout, and in
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: almost the twinkling of an eye, that man was famous
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: treasure these thoughts. Poety, sweet Poeesy, who shall estimate what
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: the world owes to thee Mary had a little lamb.
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: Its fleece was white as snow, and everywhere that Mary went,
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: the lamb was sure to go. Jack and Jill went
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: up the hill to draw a pail of water. Jack
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: fell down and broke his crown, and Jill came tumbling after.
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: For simplicity, elegance of diction, and freedom from immoral tendencies,
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: I regard those two poems in the light of Jim.
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: They are suited to all grades of intelligence, to every
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: sphere of life, to the field, to the nursery, to
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: the guild. Especially, should no board of aldermen be without
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: them venerable fossils. Right again, nothing improves one so much
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: as friendly correspondence. Right again. And if there is anything
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: in this memorial of yours that refers to anything in particular,
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: do not be backward about explaining it. We shall always
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: be happy to hear you chirp very truly, et cetera.
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: Mark Twain for James W. N Us, Senator, that is
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: an atrocious a ruinous epistle distraction. Well, sir, I am
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: really sorry if there is anything wrong about it. But
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: but it appears to me to dodge the waterlock question,
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: dodge the mischief. Oh, but never mind. As long as
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: destruction must come. Now, let it be complete. Let it
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: be complete. Let this last of your performances, which I
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: am about to read, make a finality of it. I
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: am a ruined man. I had my misgivings when I
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: gave you the letter from Humboldt asking that the post
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: route from Indian Gulch to Shakespeare Gap and intermediate points
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: be changed partly to the old Mormon trail. But I
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: told you it was a delicate question and warned you
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: to deal with it deftly, to answer it dubiously and
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: leave them a little in the dark. And your fatal
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: imbecility impelled you to make this disastrous reply. I should
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: think you would stop your ears if you are not
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: dead to all shame, Washington, November thirtieth, Messrs Perkins, Wagner,
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: et cetera. Gentlemen, it is a delicate question about this
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: Indian trail, but handled with proper deafness and dubiousness, I
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: doubt not we shall succeed in some measure or otherwise,
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: because the place where the route leaves the Lasson meadows
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: over beyond where those two Shawnee chiefs dilapidated Vengeance and
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: bite Her of the Clouds were scalped last winter, this
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: being the favorite to some, but others preferring something else.
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: In consequence of things, the Mormon Trail leaving Moseby's at
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: three in the morning and passing through Jawbone Flat to
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: Blutcher and then down to jug Handle, the road passing
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: to the right of it, and naturally leaving it on
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: the right too, and Dawson's on the left of the trail,
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: where it passes to the left of said Dawson's and
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: onward thence to Tomahawk, thus making the route cheaper, easier
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: of access to all who can get at it, and
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: compassing all the desirable objects so considered by others, and
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: therefore conferring the most good upon the greatest number. And
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: consequently I'm encouraged to hope we shall. However, I shall
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: be ready and happy to afford you still further information
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: upon the subject from time to time, as you may
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: desire it, and the Post Office Department be enabled to
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: furnish it to me very truly, et cetera. Mark Twain
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: for James W. N Us Senator there. Now, what do
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: you think of that? Well, I don't know, sir it
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: Well it appears to me to be dubious enough. Do
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: leave the house. I'm a ruined man. Those Humboldt savages
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: never will forgive me for tangling their brains up with
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: this in human letter. I've lost the respect of the
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: Methodist Church, the Board of Aldermen. Well, I haven't anything
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: to say about that, because I may have missed it
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: a little in their cases, but I was too many
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: for the Baldwin's ranch people general. Leave the house, leave
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: it forever and forever. Two. I regarded that as a
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: sort of covert intimation that my services could be dispensed with,
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: and so I resigned. I never will be a private
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: secretary to a senator again. You can't please that kind
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: of people. They don't know anything, They can't appreciate a
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: party's efforts. End of section three, Section four of A
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: Curious Dream and Other Sketches by Mark Twain. The slibrivox
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain. The facts in the
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: case of George Fisher this is history. It is not
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: a wild extravaganza like John Williamson Mackenzie's Great Beef Contract,
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: but is a plain statement of facts and circumstances with
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: which the Congress of the United States has interested itself
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: from time to time during the long period of half
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: a century. I will not call this matter of George
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: Fisher's a great, deathless and unrelenting swindle upon the government
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: and people of the United States, for it has never
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: been so decided. And I hold that it is a
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: grave and solemn wrong for a writer to cast slurs
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: or call names when such is the case, but will
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: simply present the evidence and let the reader deduce his
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: own verdict. Then we shall do nobody injustice, and our
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: consciences shall be clear honor. About the first day of
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: September eighteen thirteen, the Creek War being then in progress
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: in Florida, the crops, herds, and houses of mister George Fisher,
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: a citizen, were destroyed either by the Indians or by
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: the United States troops in pursuit of them. By the
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: terms of the law, if the Indians destroyed the property,
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: there was no relief for Fisher. But if the troops
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: destroyed it. The government of the United States was debtor
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: to Fisher for the amount involved. George Fisher must have
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: considered that the Indians destroyed the property, because although he
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: lived several years afterward, he does not appear to have
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: ever made any claim upon the government. In the course
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: of time, Fisher died and his widow married again, and
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: by and by nearly twenty years after that dimly remembered
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: raid upon Fisher's corn fields, the widow Fisher's new husband
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: petitioned Congress for pay for the property, and backed up
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: the petition with many depositions and affidavits which purported to
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: prove that the troops and not the Indians, destroyed the property.
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: That the troops, for some inscrutable reason, deliberately burned down
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: houses or cabins valued at six hundred dollars the same
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: belonging to a peaceable private citizen, and also destroyed various
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: other property belonging to the same citizen. But Congress declined
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: to believe that the troops were such idiots. After overtaking
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: and scattering, a band of Indians proved to have been
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: found destroying Fisher's property as to calmly continue the work
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: of destruction themselves and make a complete job of what
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: the Indians had only commenced. So Congress denied the petition
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: of the heirs of George Fisher in eighteen thirty two
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: and did not pay them a cent. We hear no
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: more from them officially until eighteen forty eight, sixteen years
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: after their first attempt on the treasury, and a full
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: generation after the death of the man whose fields were destroyed.
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: The new generation of Fisher heirs then came forward and
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: put in a bill for damages. The second Auditor awarded
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: them eight thousand, eight hundred and seventy three dollars, being
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: half the damage sustained by Fisher. The auditor said, the
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: testimony showed that at least half the destruction was done
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: by the Indians before the troops started in pursuit, and
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: of course the government was not responsible for that half
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: two That was in April eighteen forty eight. In December
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: eighteen forty eight, the heirs of George Fisher deceased came
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: forward and pleaded for a revision of their bill of damages.
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: The revision was made, but nothing new could be found
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: in their favor, except an error of one hundred dollars
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: in the former calculation. However, in order to keep up
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: the spirits of the Fisher family, the auditor concluded to
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: go back and allow interest from the date of the
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: first petition eighteen thirty two to the date when the
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: bill of damages was awarded. This sent the Fisher's home
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: happy with sixteen years interest on eight thousand, eight hundred
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: seventy three dollars, with the same amount to eight thousand,
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: nine hundred ninety seven dollars ninety four cents total seventeen thousand,
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: eight hundred seventy dollars and ninety four cents three entire year.
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: The suffering Fisher family remained quiet, even satisfied. After a fashion.
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: Then they swooped down upon the government with their wrongs.
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: Once more. That old Patriot Attorney General Tausei burrowed through
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: the musty papers of the Fishers and discovered one more
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: chance for the desolate orphans. Interest on that original award
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: of eight thousand, eight hundred and seventy three dollars from
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: date of destruction of the property eighteen thirteen up to
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: eighteen thirty two result ten thousand and four dollars eighty
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: nine cents for the indigent Fishers. So now we have
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: first eight thousand, eight hundred and seventy three dollars damages,
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: second interest on it from eighteen thirty two to eighteen
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: forty eight eighty nine hundred and ninety seven dollars ninety
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: four cents. Third interest on it dated back to eighteen thirteen,
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: ten thousand, four dollars and eighty nine cents total twenty
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: seven thousand, eight hundred and seventy five dollars eighty three cents.
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: What better investment for a great grandchild than to get
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: the Indians to burn a cornfie for him sixty or
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: seventy years before his birth and plausibly lay it on
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: lunatic United States troops. Four Strange as it may seem,
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: the Fishers let Congress alone for five years, or what
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: is perhaps more likely, failed to make themselves heard by
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: Congress for that length of time. But at last, in
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: eighteen fifty four they got a hearing. They persuaded Congress
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: to pass an act requiring the auditor to re examine
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: their case. But this time they stumbled upon the misfortune
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: of an honest Secretary of the Treasury, mister James Guthrie,
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: and he spoiled everything. He said in very plain language,
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: that the Fishers were not only not entitled to another cent,
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: but that those children of many sorrows and acquainted with
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: grief have been paid too much already. Five. Therefore, another
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: interval of rest and silence ensued, an interval which lasted
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: four years visa ye till eighteen fifty eight. The right man,
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: in the right place was then Secretary of War, John B. Floyd,
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: a peculiar renown. Here was a master intellect. Here was
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: the very man to succor the suffering heirs of dead
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: and forgotten Fisher. They came up from Florida with a rush,
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: a great tidal wave of fishers, freighted with the same
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: old musty documents about the same immortal corn fields of
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: their ancestor. They straightway got an act passed transferring the
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: Fisher matter from the dull auditor to the ingenious Floyd.
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: What did Floyd do? He said, it was proved that
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: the Indians destroyed everything they could before the troops entered
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: in pursuit. He considered, therefore that what they destroyed must
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: have consisted of the houses with all their contents, and
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: the liquor, the most trifling part of the destruction and
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: set down at only thirty two hundred dollars all told,
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: and that the government troops then drove them off and
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: calmly proceeded to destroy two hundred and twenty acres of
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: corn in the field, thirty five acres of wheat, and
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: nine hundred and eighty six head of livestock. What a
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: singularly intelligent army we had in those days, according to
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: mister Floyd, though not according to the Congress of eighteen
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: thirty two. So mister Floyd decided that the government was
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: not responsible for that thirty two hundred dollars worth of
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: rubbish which the Indians destroyed, but was responsible for the
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: property destroyed by the troops. Which property consisted of I
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: quote from the printed U. S. Senate document. Corn at
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: Bassett's Creek three thousand dollars, cattle five thousand dollars, stock
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: hogs one thousand, fifty dollars, drove hogs one thousand, two
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: hundred four dollars, wheat three hundred and fifty dollars, hides
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: four thousand dollars. Corn on the Alabama River thirty five
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: hundred dollars, totaling eighteen thousand, one hundred and four dollars.
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: That sum in his report, mister Floyd calls the full
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: value of the property destroy by the troops. He allowed
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: that sum to the starving fishers, together with interest from
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: eighteen thirteen. From this new sum total, the amounts already
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: paid to the fishers were deducted, and then the cheerful
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: remainder a fraction under forty thousand dollars was handed to them,
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: and again they retired to Florida in a condition of
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: temporary tranquility. Their ancestors farm had now yielded them altogether
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: nearly sixty seven thousand dollars in cash. Six Does the
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: reader suppose that that was the end of it? Does
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: he suppose those diffident fishures were satisfied? Let the evidence
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: show the fishers were quiet just two years. Then they
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: came swarming up out of the fertile swamps of Florida
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: with their same old documents and besieged Congress once more.
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: Congress capitulated on the first of June eighteen sixty and
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: instructed mister Floyd to overhaul those papers again and pay
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: that bill. A Treasury clerk was ordered to go through
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: those papers and report to mister Floyd what amount was
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: still due the emaciated fishers. This clerk, I can produce
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: him whenever he is wanted, discovered what was apparently a
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: glaring and recent forgery in the papers, whereby a witness's
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: testimony as to the price of corn in Florida in
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: eighteen thirteen was made to name double the amount which
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: that witness had originally specified as the price. The clerk
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: not only called his superior's attention to this thing, but
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: in making up his brief of the case, called particular
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: attention to it, in writing that part of the brief
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: never got before Congress, nor has Congress ever yet had
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: a hint of a forgery existing among the Fisher papers. Nevertheless,
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: on the basis of the doubled prices, and totally ignoring
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: the Clerk's assertion that the figures were manifestly and unquestionably
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: a recent forgery, mister Floyd remarks in his new report
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: that the testimony, particularly in regard to the corn crops
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: a man's a much higher allowance than any heretofore made
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: by the Auditor or myself. So he estimates the crop
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: at sixty bushels to the acre, double what Florida acres produce,
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: and then virtuously allows pay for only half the crop,
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: but allows two dollars and a half a bushel for
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: that half, when there are rustial books and documents in
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: the Congressional Library to show just what the Fisher testimony
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: showed before the forgery. VI's a e that in the
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: fall of eighteen thirteen corn was only worth from one
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: dollar twenty five cents to one dollar fifty cents a bushel.
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: Having accomplished this, what does mister Floyd do next? Mister Floyd,
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: with an earnest desire to execute truly the legislative will,
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: as he piously remarks, goes to work and makes out
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: an entirely new bill of Fisher damages. And in this
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: new bill he placidly ignores the Indians altogether puts no
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: particle of the destruction of the Fisher property upon them,
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: but even repenting him of charging them with burning the
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: cabins and drinking the whisky and breaking the crockery, lays
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: the entire damage at the door of the imbecile United
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: States troops down to the very last item, and not
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: only that, but uses the forgery to double the loss
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: of corn at Bassett's Creek and uses it again to
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: absolutely triple the loss of corn on the Alabama River.
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: This new and ably conceived and executed bill of mister
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: Floyd's figures up as follows. I copy again from the
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: printed US Senate document The United States An Account with
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: the legal representatives of George Fisher Deceased, eighteen thirteen to
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: five hundred and fifty head of cattle at ten dollars ahead,
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: five thousand, five hundred dollars to eighty six head of
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: drove hogs, one thousand, two hundred four dollars to three
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: hundred and fifty head of stock hogs, one thousand, seven
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: hundred and fifty to one hundred acres of corn on
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: Bassett's Creek, six thousand dollars to eight barrels of whiskey,
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: three hundred and fifty dollars to two barrels of brandy,
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: two hundred thirty dollars to one barrel of rum, seventy
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: dollars to dry goods and merchandise in store, one thousand,
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: one hundred dollars to thirty five acres of wheat, three
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: hundred and fifty dollars to two thousand hides, four thousand
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: dollars to furs and hats in store, six hundred dollars
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: to crockery were in store, one hundred dollars to smith's
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: and carpenter's tools, two hundred and fifty dollars to houses
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: burned and destroyed, six hundred dollars to four dozen bottles
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: of wine, Forty eight dollars eighteen fourteen to one hundred
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: and twenty acres of corn on Alabama River, nine thousand,
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: five hundred dollars to crops of peas, fodder, et cetera.
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: Three thousand, two hundred and fifty dollars total thirty four thousand,
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: nine hundred and fifty two dollars to interest on twenty
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: two thousand, two hundred two dollars from July eighteen, te
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: thirteen to November eighteen sixty forty seven years and four months,
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: sixty three thousand, fifty three dollars and sixty eight cents
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: to interest on twelve thousand, seven hundred fifty dollars from
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: September eighteen fourteen to November eighteen sixty forty six years
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: and two months, thirty five thousand, three hundred seventeen dollars
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: and fifty cents total one hundred and thirty three thousand,
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: three hundred and twenty three dollars and eighteen cents. He
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: puts everything in this time. He does not even allow
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: that the Indians destroyed the crockery or drank the four
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: dozen bottles of currant wine. When it came to supernatural
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: comprehensiveness in gobbling, John B. Floyd was without his equal
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: in his own or any other generation. Subtracting from the
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: above total the sixty seven thousand dollars already paid to
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: George Fisher's implacable heirs, mister Floyd announced that the government
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: was still indebted to them in the sum of sixty
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: six thousand, five hundred and night teen dollars and eighty
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: five cents, which mister Floyd complacently remarks will be paid
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: accordingly to the administrator of the estate of George Fisher deceased,
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: or to his attorney in fact. But sadly enough for
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: the destitute orphans, a new president came in just at
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: this time. Buchanan and Floyd went out, and they never
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: got their money. The first thing Congress did in eighteen
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: sixty one was to rescind the resolution of June first,
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: eighteen sixty under which mister Floyd had been ciphering then Floyd,
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: and doubtless the heirs of George Fisher likewise had to
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: give up financial business for a while and go into
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: the Confederate Army and serve their country. Were the heirs
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: of George Fisher killed? No, they are back now at
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: this very time, July eighteen seventy, beseeching Congress through that
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: blushing and diffident creature Garrett Davis to commence making payments
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: again on their interminable and insatiable bill of damage is
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: for corn and whiskey destroyed by a gang of irresponsible
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: Indians so long ago that even government red tape has
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: failed to keep consistent and intelligent track of it. Now
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: the above are facts, they are history. Anyone who doubts
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: it can send to the Senate Document Department of the
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: Capital for hr X Doc Number twenty one thirty six Congress,
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: Second Session and for s X Doc number one oh
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: six forty first Congress, Second Session, and satisfy himself. The
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: whole case is set forth in the first volume of
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 1: the Court of Claims Reports. It is my belief that
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 1: as long as the continent of America holds together, the
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: heirs of George Fisher deceased, will still make pilgrimages to
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: Washington from the swamps of Florida to plead for just
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: a little more cash on their bill of damages. Even
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: when they received the last of that sixty seven thousand dollars,
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: they said it was only one fourth what the government
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: owed them on that fruitful cornfield. And as long as
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 1: they choose to come, they will find Garrett Davis's to
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: drag their vampire schemes before Congress. This is not the
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: only hereditary fraud. If fraud it is, which I have
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: before repeatedly remarked, is not proven, that is being quietly
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: handed down from generation to generation of fathers and sons
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: through the persecuted treasury of the United States. End of
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: Section four, Section five of A Curious Dream and other
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 1: sketches by Mark Twain. This LibriVox recording is in the
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 1: public domain. The new crime legislation needed this country during
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: the last thirty or forty years has produced some of
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: the most remarkable cases of insanity of which there is
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: any mention in history. For instance, there was the Baldwin
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: case in Ohio twenty two years ago. Baldwin, from his
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: boyhood up had been of a vindictive, malignant, quarrelsome nature.
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: He put a boy's eye out once, and never was heard,
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: upon any occasion to utter a regret for it. He
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 1: did many such things, but at last he did something
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: that was serious. He called at a house just after
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: dark one evening, knocked, and when the occupant came to
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 1: the door, shot him dead, and then tried to escape,
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 1: but was captured. Two days before, he had wantonly insulted
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: a helpless cripple, and the man he afterward took swift
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: vengeance upon with an assassin bullet, had knocked him down.
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: Such was the Baldwin case. The trial was long and exciting.
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: The community was fearfully wrought up. Men said, this spiteful,
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: bad hearted villain had caused grief enough in his time,
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: and now he should satisfy the law. But they were mistaken.
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: Baldwin was insane when he did the deed. They had
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: not thought of that. By the arguments of counsel, it
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: was shown that at half past ten in the morning
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 1: on the day of the murder, Baldwin became insane and
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: remained so for eleven hours and a half exactly. This
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: just covered the case comfortably, and he was acquitted. Thus,
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: if an unthinking and excited community had been listened to
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: instead of the arguments of counsel, a poor crazy creature
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: would have been held to a fearful responsibility for a
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: mere freak of madness. Baldwin went clear, and although his
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: relatives and friends were naturally incensed against the community for
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: their injurious suspicions and remarks, they said let it go
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: for this time and did not prosecute. The Baldwins were
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 1: very wealthy the same Baldwin had momentary fits of insanity
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 1: twice afterward, and on both occasions killed people he had
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: grudges against, And on both these occasions these circumstances of
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: the killing were so aggravated, and the murders so seemingly
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: heartless and treacherous, that if Baldwin had not been insane,
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 1: he would have been hanged without the shadow of a doubt.
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: As it was, it required all his political and family
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 1: influence to get him clear in one of the cases,
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: and cost him not less than ten thousand dollars to
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 1: get clear in the other. One of these men he
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: had notoriously been threatening to kill for twelve years. The
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: poor creature happened by the merest piece of ill fortune
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 1: to come along a dark alley at the very moment
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: that Baldwin's insanity came upon him, and so he was
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: shot in the back with a gun loaded with slugs.
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: Take the case of Lynch Hackett of Pennsylvania. Twice in
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: public he attacked a German butcher by the name of
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 1: be Miss Feldner with a cane, and both times Feldner
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 1: whipped him with his fists. Hackett was a vain, wealthy,
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 1: violent gentleman who held his blood and family in high
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: esteem and believed that a reverent respect was due his
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: great riches. He brooded over the shame of his chastisement
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 1: for two weeks, and then, in a momentary fit of
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: his insanity, armed himself to the teeth, rode into town,
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: waited a couple of hours until he saw Feldner coming
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 1: down the street with his wife on his arm, and then,
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: as the couple passed the doorway in which he had
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: partially concealed himself, he drove a knife into Feldner's neck,
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: killing him instantly. The widow caught the limp form and
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: eased it to the earth. Both were drenched with blood.
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: Hackett jocosely remarked to her that as a professional butcher's
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: recent wife, she could appreciate the artistic neatness of the
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: job that left her in a condition to marry again
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: in case she wanted to. This remark and another which
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: he made to a friend that his position in society
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: made the killing of an obscure citizen simply in eccentricity
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: instead of a crime, were shown to be evidences of insanity,
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 1: and so Hackett escaped punishment. The jury were hardly inclined
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 1: to accept these as proofs at first, inasmuch as the
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 1: prisoner had never been insane before the murder, and under
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: the tranquilizing effect of the butchering, had immediately regained his
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: right mind. But when the defense came to show that
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: a third cousin of Hackett's wife's stepfather was insane, and
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: not only insane, but had a nose to the very
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: counterpart of Hackett's, it was plain that insanity was hereditary
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: in the family, and Hackett had come by it by
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: legitimate inheritance. Of course, the jury then acquitted him, but
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 1: it was a merciful providence that missus H's people had
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: been afflicted, as shown else Hackett would certainly have been hanged. However,
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: it is not possible to recount all the marvelous cases
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: of insanity that have come under the public notice in
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 1: the last thirty or forty years. There was the Durgon
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 1: case in New Jersey three years ago. The servant girl
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: Bridget Durgan, at dead of night invaded her mistress's bedroom
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 1: and car of the lady literally to pieces with a knife.
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 1: Then she dragged the body to the middle of the
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: floor and beat and banged it with chairs in such things.
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: Next she opened the feather beds and strewed the contents around,
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 1: saturated everything with kerosene, and set fire to the general wreck.
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 1: She now took up the young child of the murdered
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 1: woman and her blood smeared hands, and walked off through
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 1: the snow with no shoes on to a neighbor's house
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: a quarter of a mile off, and told a string
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 1: of wild, incoherent stories about some men coming and setting
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: fire to the house. And then she cried piteously and
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: without seeming to think there was anything suggestive about the
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 1: blood upon her hands, her clothing, and the baby volunteered
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 1: the remark that she was afraid those men had murdered
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 1: her mistress. Afterward, by her own confession and other testimony,
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: it was proved that the mistress had always been kind
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 1: to the girl. Consequently, there was no revenge in the murder,
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: and it was also shown that the girl took nothing
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: away from the burning house, not even her own shoes,
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: and consequently robbery was not the motive. Now, the reader says,
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: here comes that same old plea of insanity again. But
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 1: the reader has deceived himself. This time, no such plea
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 1: was offered in her defense. The judge sentenced her, nobody
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: persecuted the governor with petitions for her pardon, and she
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: was promptly hanged. There is that youth in Pennsylvania whose
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 1: curious confession was published a year ago. It was simply
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 1: a conglomeration of incoherent drivel from beginning to end, and
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 1: so was his lengthy speech on the scaffold afterward. For
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 1: a whole year he was haunted with a desire to
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 1: disfigure a certain young woman so that no one would
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: marry her. He did not love her himself, and did
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 1: not want to marry her, but he did not want
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 1: anybody else to do it. He would not go anywhere
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 1: with her, and yet was opposed to anybody else's escorting her.
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: Upon one occasion he declined to go to a wedding
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: with her, and when she got other company, lay in
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 1: wait for the couple by the road, intending to make
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: them go back or kill the escort. After spending sleepless
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: nights over his ruling desire for her a full year,
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: he at last attempted its execution, that is, attempted to
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: disfigure the young woman. It was a success, it was permanent.
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: And trying to shoot her cheek as she sat at
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 1: the supper table with her parents and brothers and sisters
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 1: in such a manner as to Mart's comeliness, one of
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 1: his bullets wandered a little out of the course, and
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: she dropped dead. To the very last moment of his life,
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: he bewailed the ill luck that made her move her
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: face just at the critical moment, and so he died,
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: apparently about half persuaded that somehow it was chiefly her
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: own fault that she got killed. This idiot was hanged.
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 1: The plea of insanity was not offered. Insanity certainly is
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 1: on the increase in the world, and crime is dying out.
• 1:14:47
  Speaker 1: There are no longer any murders, none worth mentioning at
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: any rate. Formerly, if you killed a man, it was
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: possible that you were insane. But now if you, having
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 1: friends and money, kill a man, it is evidence that
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: you are a lunatic. In these days too, if a
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: person of good family and high social standing steals anything,
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 1: they call it kleptomania and send him to the lunatic asylum.
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: If a person of high standing squanders his fortune and
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: dissipation and closes his career with strychnine or a bullet,
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 1: temporary aberration is what was the trouble with him? Is
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: not this insanity plea becoming rather common? Is it not
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 1: so common that the reader confidently expects to see it
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 1: offered in every criminal case that comes before the courts?
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 1: And is it not so cheap and so common, and
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: often so trivial that the reader smiles in derision when
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: the newspaper mentions it. And is it not curious to
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 1: note how very often it wins acquittal for the prisoner. Lately,
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 1: it does not seem possible for a man to so
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: conduct himself before killing another man as not to be
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 1: manifestly insane. If he talks about the stars, he is insane.
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 1: If he appears nervous uneasy hour before the killing, he
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 1: is insane. If he weeps over a great grief, his
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 1: friends shake their heads in fear that he is not right.
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 1: If an hour after the murder he seems ill at ease, preoccupied,
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: and excited, he is unquestionably insane. Really, what we want
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 1: now is not laws against crime, but a law against insanity.
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 1: There is where the true evil lies. End of section five,
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 1: Section six of A Curious Dream and other sketches by
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 1: Mark Twain. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: Lionizing Murderers. I had heard so much about the celebrated
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: fortune teller Madame Blank, that I went to see her yesterday.
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 1: She has a dark complexion naturally, and this effect is
• 1:17:01
  Speaker 1: heightened by artificial aids, which cost her nothing. She wears curls,
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 1: very black ones, and I had an impression that she
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 1: gave their native attractiveness a lift with rancid butter. She
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 1: wears a reddish check handkerchief cast loosely around her neck,
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 1: and it was plain that her other one is slowly
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 1: getting back from the wash. I presume she takes snuff
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: at any rate, something resembling it had lodged among the
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 1: hairs sprouting from her upper lip. I know she likes garlic.
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: I knew that as soon as she sighed. She looked
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 1: at me searchingly for nearly a minute with her black eyes,
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 1: and then said it is enough. Come. She started down
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: a very dark and dismal corridor, I stepping close after her.
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 1: Presently she stopped and said that as the way was
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 1: crooked and so dark, perhaps she had better get a light.
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 1: But it seemed ungallant to allow a woman to put
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 1: herself to so much trouble for me, and so I
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 1: said it is not worth while, madam. If you will
• 1:17:59
  Speaker 1: heave another sigh, I think I can follow it. So
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: we got along all right, arrived at her office and
• 1:18:05
  Speaker 1: mysterious din She asked me to tell her the date
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 1: of my birth, the exact hour of that occurrence, and
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: the color of my grandmother's hair. I answered as accurately
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 1: as I could. Then she said, young man, summon your fortitude,
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 1: Do not tremble. I am about to reveal the past.
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 1: Information concerning the future would be in a general way
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 1: more silence. You have had much trouble, some joy, some
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 1: good fortune, some bad. Your great grandfather was hanged. That
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 1: is a silence hanged, sir, But it was not his fault.
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 1: He could not help it. I'm glad you do him justice.
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 1: Ah grieve rather that the jury did. He was hanged.
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 1: His star crosses yours in the fourth division, fifth sphere. Consequently,
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 1: you will be hanged also. In view of this cheerful
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 1: I must have silence. Yours was not in the beginning
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 1: a criminal nature, but circumstances changed it. At the age
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 1: of nine, you stole some sugar. At the age of fifteen,
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: you stole money. At twenty, you stole horses. At twenty five,
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 1: you committed arson. At thirty, hardened in crime, you became
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 1: an editor. You are now a public lecturer. Worse things
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 1: are in store for you. You will be sent to Congress,
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 1: next to the penitentiary. Finally, happiness will come again. All
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 1: will be well. You will be hanged. I was now
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 1: in tears. It seemed hard enough to go to Congress,
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 1: but to be hanged. Now, this was too sad, too dreadful.
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 1: The woman seemed surprised at my grief. I told her
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 1: the thoughts that were in my mind. Then she comforted me.
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 1: Why man, she said, Note in this paragraph The Fortune
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 1: Teller details the exact history of the Pike Brown assassination
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 1: case in New Hampshire, from the succoring and saving of
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 1: the stranger Pike by the Browns to the subsequent hanging
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 1: and coffining of that treacherous miscrant. She adds, nothing invents, nothing,
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 1: exaggerates nothing. See any New England paper for November eighteen
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 1: sixty nine. This Pike Brown case selected merely as a
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 1: type to illustrate a custom that prevails not in New
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: Hampshire alone, but in every state in the Union. I
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 1: mean the sentimental custom of visiting, petting, glorifying, and snuffling
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: over murderers like this pike, from the day they enter
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 1: the jail under the sentence of death until they swing
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: from the gallows. The following extract from Temple Bar eighteen
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 1: sixty six reveals the fact that this custom is not
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 1: confined to the United States. On December thirty first, eighteen
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 1: forty one, a man named John Johns, a shoemaker, murdered
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 1: his sweetheart, Mary Hallam, the daughter of a respectable laborer,
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 1: at Mansfield in the County of Nottingham. He was executed
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 1: on March twenty thirt eighteen forty two, was a man
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: of unsteady habits and gave way to violent fits of passion.
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 1: The girl declined his addresses, and he said if he
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 1: did not have her, no one else should. After he
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 1: had inflicted the first wound, which was not immediately fatal,
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: she begged for her life, but, seeing him resolved, asked
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 1: for time to pray. He said that he would pray
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 1: for both, and completed the crime. The wounds were inflicted
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 1: by a shoemaker's knife, and her throat was cut barbarously.
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 1: After this, he dropped on his knees some time and
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 1: prayed God to have mercy on two unfortunate lovers. He
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 1: made no attempt to escape and confessed to the crime.
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 1: After his imprisonment, he behaved in the most decorous manner.
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 1: He won upon the good opinion of the jail chaplain,
• 1:21:42
  Speaker 1: and he was visited by the Bishop of Lincoln. It
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 1: does not appear that he expressed any contrition for the crime,
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 1: but seemed to pass away with triumphant certainty that he
• 1:21:51
  Speaker 1: was going to rejoin his victim in heaven. He was
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 1: visited by some pious and benevolent ladies of Nottingham, some
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 1: of whom declared he was a child out of God.
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 1: If ever there was one, one of the ladies sent
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 1: him a white camellia to wear at his execution. End note,
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 1: hold up your head, you have nothing to grieve about. Listen,
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: you will live in New Hampshire, and your sharp need
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: and distress the Brown family will succor you. Some of them,
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 1: as Pike the assassin left alive. They will be benefactors
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 1: to you. When you shall have grown fat upon their
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 1: bounty and are grateful and happy, you will desire to
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 1: make some modest return for these things, And so you
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 1: will go to the house some night and brain the
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: whole family with an axe. You will rob the dead
• 1:22:39
  Speaker 1: bodies of your benefactors and disburse your gains and riotous
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 1: living among the rowdies and courtesans of Boston. Then you
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: will be arrested, tried, condemned, to be hanged, thrown into prison.
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 1: Now is your happy day. You will be converted. You
• 1:22:57
  Speaker 1: will be converted just as soon as every effort to
• 1:23:00
  Speaker 1: compass pardon, commutation, or reprieve has failed. And then, why then,
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 1: every morning and every afternoon the best and purest young
• 1:23:09
  Speaker 1: ladies of the village will assemble in your cell and
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 1: sing hymns. This will show that assassination is respectable. Then
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 1: you will write a touching letter in which you will
• 1:23:19
  Speaker 1: forgive all those recent browns. This will excite the public admiration.
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 1: No public can withstand magnanimity. Next they will take you
• 1:23:30
  Speaker 1: to the scaffold with great eclaw, at the head of
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 1: an imposing procession composed of clergymen, officials, citizens generally, and
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 1: young ladies walking pensively two and two and bearing bouquets
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: and immortals. You will mount the scaffold, and while the
• 1:23:45
  Speaker 1: great concourse stand uncovered in your presence, you will read
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 1: your sappy little speech which the Minister has written for you.
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 1: And then, in the midst of a grand and impressive silence,
• 1:23:55
  Speaker 1: they will swing you into pur paradise. My son, there
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 1: will not be a dry eye on the ground. You
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 1: will be a hero, not a ruff there, but will
• 1:24:06
  Speaker 1: envy you. Not a ruff there, but will resolve to
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 1: emulate you. And next a great procession will follow you
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 1: to the tomb, will weep over your remains. The young
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 1: ladies will sing again the hymns made dear by sweet
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 1: associations connected with the jail, And as a last tribute
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 1: of affection, respect and appreciation of your many sterling qualities.
• 1:24:25
  Speaker 1: They will walk too and to around your bier, and
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 1: strew wreaths of flowers on it, And lo you are canonized.
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 1: Think of its son in great assassin, robber of the dead,
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 1: drunken brawler among thieves and harlots in the slums of
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 1: Boston one month, and the pet of the pure and
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 1: innocent daughters of the land the next, A bloody and
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 1: hateful devil, a bewept, bewailed, and sainted martyr, all in
• 1:24:52
  Speaker 1: a month, fool so noble, a fortune, and yet you
• 1:24:56
  Speaker 1: sit here grieving. No, ma'am, I said, you do me wrong.
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 1: You do. Indeed, I am perfectly satisfied. I did not
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 1: know before that my great grandfather was hanged, but it
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 1: is of no consequence. He has probably ceased to bother
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 1: about it by this time, and I have not commenced yet.
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 1: I confess, madam, that I do something in the way
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: of editing and lecturing. But the other crimes you mention
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 1: have escaped my memory. Yet I must have committed them.
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 1: You would not deceive an orphan. But let the past
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 1: be as it was, and let the future be as
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 1: it may these are nothing. I have only cared for
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 1: one thing. I have always felt that I should be
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: hanged some day, and somehow the thought has annoyed me considerably.
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 1: But if you can only assure me that I shall
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 1: be hanged in New Hampshire, not a shadow of a doubt,
• 1:25:46
  Speaker 1: bless you, my benefactress. Excuse this embrace. You have removed
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: a great load from my breast to be hanged in
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 1: New Hampshire's happiness. It leaves an honored name behind a
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 1: man and introduces him at once into the best in
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 1: New Hampshire society. In the other world, I then took
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 1: leave of the fortune teller. But seriously, is it well
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 1: to glorify a murderous villain on the scaffold as Pike
• 1:26:08
  Speaker 1: was glorified in New Hampshire? Is it well to turn
• 1:26:12
  Speaker 1: the penalty for a bloody crime into a reward? Is
• 1:26:15
  Speaker 1: it just to do it? Is it safe? End of
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 1: Section six and End of a Curious Dream and other
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 1: sketches by Mark Twain read by Ben Tucker